LINCOLN  ROOM 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
LIBRARY 


I 


^^ 


Facts  and  Falsehoods 

Concerning  the  War 

on    the    South 

1861-1865 


By    George   Edmonds 


PRICE,    50    CENTS 


FOR  SALE  BY 

A.   R.  TAYLOR  &  CO., 

MEMPHIS   TENN. 


Copyright.  1904,  By  Spence  Hall  1,amb. 


To  the  People  of  the  South 

This  little  work  is  offered.  It  does  not  aspire  to  the  dignity 
of  History.  It  is  mostly  a  collection  of  facts  under  one  cover, 
which  I  trust  will  prove  of  use  to  the  future  historians  of  the 
South.  Perhaps  the  fittest  title  to  this  work  would  be  "A  Pro- 
test Against  Injustice" — the  injustice  of  misrepresentation — of 
false  charges — of  lies.  The  feeling  of  injustice  certainly  in- 
spired the  idea  of  this  work.  The  greater  number  of  the  facts 
herein  laid  before  the  reader  were  not  drawn  from  Southern 
or  Democratic  sources,  but  from  high  Republican  authorities. 
Part  first  of  this  work  presents  Abraham  Lincoln  to  the  people 
of  this  generation  as  his  contemporaries  saw  and  knew  him. 
The  characteristics  portrayed  will  be  a  revelation  to  many 
readers.  As  an  offset  to  the  falsity  of  Republican  histories  of 
the  war  of  the  6o's,  permit  me  to  express  the  hope  that  in  the 
near  future  our  people  will  make  more  general  use  of  those 
histories  which  are  triithful  and  just  to  the  South.  For  in- 
stance, the  English  historian,  Percy  Gregg's  large  history  of 
the  United  States,  might  be  condensed,  or  rather  that  part  giv- 
ing the  story  of  the  6o's  couKl  be  detached,  and  published  in 
one  small,  cheap  volume,  so  that  every  family  in  the  South  can 
own  a  copy.  John  A.  Marshall's  large  volume.  "American 
Bastiles,"  can  be  used  in  every  Southern  school  to  rouse  in  the 
hearts  of  boys  and  girls  hatred  of  Despotism.  .S.  D.  Car- 
penter's "Logic  of  History,"  and  ]\Tatthew  Carey's  "Democratic 
Handbook"  should  not  be  allowed  to  go  out  of  print.  Both  of 
these  books  contain  much  that  will  be  of  great  value  to  the 
future  historian. 


1 . 


You  may  fool  all  the  people  part  of  the  time, 
You  may  fool  some  of  the  people  all  the  time, 
But  you  can't  fool  all  the  people  all  the  time. 

— Abraham  Lincoln. 


"All  lies  have  sentence  of  death  written  against  them  in 
Heaven's  Chancery  itself,  and  slowly  or  fast,  advance  inces- 
santly toward  their  hour." — Carlyle. 


I  sing  the  hymn  of  the  Conquered  who  fell  in  the  battle  of  life, 

The  hymn  of  the  wounded,  the  beaten,  who  died  overwhelmed  in  the 

strife ; 
Not  the  jubilant  song  of  the  Victors  for  whom  the  resounding  acclaim 
Of  nations  was  lifted   in   chorus,   whose   brows   wore   the   chaplet  of 

fame. 
While  the  voice  of  the  world  shouts  its  chorus,  its  paeon  for  those 

who  have  won. 
While  the  trumpet   is  sounding  triumphant,   and   high  to  the  breezt 

and  the  sun. 
Gay  banners  are  waving,  hands  clapping  and  hurrying  feet 
Throwing   after   the   laurel-crowned   victors,   I   stand   on   the   field   of 

Defeat. 
Speak    History!     Who    are    Life's    victors?     Unroll    thy    long    annals 

and  say, 
Are  they  those  whom  the  world  called  the  victors,  who  won  the  success 

of  a  day? 
The  Martyrs  or  Nero?     The  Spartans  who  fell  at  Thermopylae's  tryst 
Or    the    I'ersians    and    Xerxes?     His  judges,  or  Socrates?      Pilate    or 

Christ? 

— W.  W.  STORY. 
Blackwood's   Magazine,   1881. 


n 


Authorities.        * 

The  following  are  cited  as  some  of  the  authorities  for  the 
matters  stated  in  the  pages  of  this  little  book  and  here  sum- 
marized for  brevity : 

1. — The  Olive  Branch,  by  Carey,  Boston,  1814. 

2. — The  Pelham  Papers,  published  1796,  in  the  Connecticut  Courant, 

Hartford. 
3. — The  Logic  of  History — S.  D.  Carpenter,  1864,  Editor  Wisconsin 

Patriot. 
4. — History  of  the  United  States — John  Clark  Ridpath,  1880. 
5. — Notes  on  History  of  Slavery  in  Massachusets — George  H.  Moore, 

1866. 
6. — History  of  the  Negro   Race  in  America,   1883 — George  W.   Wil- 
liams, first  colored  member  of  the  Ohio  Legislature,   and  late 
Judge  Advocate  of  the  Grand  Army  of  the  Republic  of  Ohio. 
7. — Abraham    Lincoln — Norman    Hapgood,    1899. 
8. — Abraham    Lincoln — J.    G.    Holland,    1865,    Editor    Scribner. 
9.— Abraham  Lincoln — Ida  Tarbell. 
10 — American  Conflict — By  Horace  Greeley,  Editor  New  York  Tribune. 
11.— Life  of  Lincoln— John  T.  Morse,  1892. 
12. — Life    of    O.    P.    Morton,    Governor    of    Indiana,    William    Dudley 

Foulk,  1899. 
13.— History    of    the    United    States— Benjamin    E.    Andrews,    1894, 

President  Brown  University. 
14.— Life  of  Hannibal  Hamlin. 

15.— The  Story  of  the  Civil  War— John   Codman  Ropes,   1894. 
16. — Disunion    and    Reunion — Woodrow    Wilson,    1893,    Professor    in 
Princeton   University,   New   Jersey. 
*17.— The   Real   Lincoln— Charles   L.    C.    Minor,    1901. 
18.— Lincoln   and   Men   of  the  War  Time— A.   K.   McClure,   1892. 
19.— Our  Presidents  and  How  We  Make  Them— A.  K.  McClure,  1900. 
20. — Life    of    Lincoln — Nicolay    and    Hay,    1890. 
*21. — American    Bastiles — John   A.    Marshall,    1882. 
22.— History  of  the  United   States— James   Ford  Rhodes,   1893. 
23. — My  Diary,  North  and  South — William  Howard  Russell,  published 

originally  in  the  London  Times  during  the  War. 
24. — Personal   Memoirs  of  U.    S.   Grant,    1885. 
25. — The   Great    Conspiracy — General    John    A.    Logan. 
26.— Men   Who   Saved   the   Union— General    Don    Piatt.    1887. 
27.— Butler's   Book— General   B.   F.    Butler    (Beast   Butler),   1892. 
28. — Executive    Power — Benjamin    R.    Curtis,    Judge    United    States 

Supreme  Court. 
29. — Lalor's    Encyclopedia — Edited    by    John    J.    Lalor,    1881. 
30.— William  H.  Seward— Frederick  Bancroft,  1900. 
31. — True    Story    of   a   Great   Life — William    H.    Herndon    and    Jesse 
William  Weik,  1889. 
*32. — Democratic  Speaker's  Handbook — Matthew  Carey,  Jr.,  1868. 
33. — Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln — Joseph  Barrett  and  Charles  W.  Brown, 

1902. 
34. — Nullification  and  Secession  in  the  United  States. — E.  P.  Powell, 

1897. 
35. — Suppressed  Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  by  William  H.   Herndon, 

published    soon    after    Lincoln's    death. 
36. — Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  by  Ward  H.  Lamon,  1872. 
37. — Story    of   the  Great   March — George    W.    Nichols,    Aid    de    Camp 
to  General   Sherman,  1865. 
*38. — Southern  Historical  Papers. 
*These  are  Southern  and  Democratic.     .Ml  the  ottiers  are  Northern  and  Republican. 

ill. 


CONTENTS 


PART    I 

CHAPTER  I.— P.  I. 
Abraham   Lincoln. 

CHAPTER  n.— P.  5. 

A  glance  over  the  country's  situation  at  the  moment  of  Lin- 
coln's death.  Republicans  drunk  with  joy.  Their  vindictive 
policy.     They  fear  and  distrust  Andrew  Johnson. 

CHAPTER  TH.— P.  8. 
The  apotheosis  of  Abraham  Lincoln  ;  its  cause  and  effect. 

CHAPTER  IV.— P.  12. 
The  estimate  Republican  leaders  held  of  the  living  Lincoln. 

CHAPTER  v.— P.   16. 

Wendell  Phillips'  estimate  of  Lincoln.  Secretary  of  War 
Stanton's  opinion.  The  Wade  and  Winter  Davis  manifesto. 
Stanton's  first  interview  with  Lincoln.  His  insulting  treat- 
ment of  Lincoln.  General  McClellan's  letters  to  his  wife. 
Lincoln  reads  Artemas  Ward  at  Cabinet  meeting.  Chase's 
disgust.  Lincoln's  hilarity.  Why  did  Lincoln  appoint 
Stanton  Cabinet  Minister?  Seward  on  United  States  Consti- 
tution. 


1  V  . 


CHAPTER  VI.— P.  23. 

A  Western  Republican  paper  propounds  the  true  Republican 
doctrine. 

CHAPTER  VH.— P.  30. 

Grant  and  Washburn  defy  Lincoln's  authority .  Washburn 
bullies  Lincoln.  A  United  States  Senator  bullies  Lincoln.  Senator 
Wade  storms  at  him..  Senator  Hale  assails  him.  Congress 
distrusts  him.  Rev.  M.  Fuller's  opinion  of  Lincoln.  Lincoln's 
trickery. 

CHAPTER  VHL— P.  34. 
Herndon's  pen  portrait  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  A  Springfield 
lawyer's  pen  portrait.  General  Piatt  on  "Pious  Lies."  The 
"real  Lincoln  disappears  from  human  knowledge."  Hern- 
don's "Life  of  Lincoln."  Why  suppressed.  Extracts  from  sup- 
pressed book. 

CHAPTER  IX.— P.  43. 
Lincoln's  jealousy.  His  passion  for  horse  races,  cock  fights 
and  fist  fights.  Holland's  comment  thereon.  Lincoln  the  "soul 
of  honesty."  He  passes  off  counterfeit  money.  His  "tender- 
heartedness." He  sews  up  hogs'  eyes.  "The  Old  Huzzy."  A 
great  fight.     "I  am  the  big  buck  of  the  lick." 

CHAPTER  X.— P.  52. 

Mr.  Lincoln  hates  and  despises  Christianity.  He  goes  to  church 
to  mock  and  deride  "pious  lies."  Holland's  strange  story.  Other 
Republican   leaders   despise   Christianity.     The    four   Ws. 

CHAPTER  XL— P.  60. 
Lincoln's  singular  treatment  of  the  lady  he  four  times  asked 
to  marry  him.     His  curious  letter  about  that  lady.     His   cruel 
treatment  of  Miss  Todd.     His  home  a  hell  on  earth. 

CHAPTER  XIL— P.  e^j. 

Mr.  Lincoln's  passion  for  indecent  stories.  Holland's  comment 
thereon.  The  "foulest  in  stories  of  any  other  man."  Governor 
Andrews'  disgust.  Lincoln  writes  indecent  things.  He  dislikes 
ladies^  society. 

CHAPTER  XIIL— P.  73. 

Lincoln  and  Lamon  visit  Antietam  battlefield.  Lincoln  calls 
for  comic  songs;  Lamon  sings  "Picayune  Butler."  General  Mc- 
Clellan  shocked.     The- Perkins'  letter.     Mr.  Lincoln's  reply. 

V. 


CHAPTER  XIV.— P.  78. 

The  true  and  the  false.  Apotheosizing  writers.  Miss  Tarbell 
takes  the  lead.  Why  Lincoln's  father  left  Kentucky.  Apotheo- 
sis twaddle.  Two  little  g^irls  in  the  White  House.  More  twaddle. 
A  study  of  Lincoln's  character. 

CHAPTER  X\'.— P.  86. 

A  brief  mention  of  the  two  policies.  President  Johnson  and 
the  Republican  leaders. 


PART    II 

CHAPTER  XVL— P.  91. 

Antagonistic  principles.  The  great  American  monarchist. 
Federalists  fear  and  hate  Democracy.  War  on  the  South  began 
in  1796.  The  Olive  Branch.  The  Pelham  papers.  Xew  En- 
gland begins  work  for  disunion  and  secession  in   1796. 

CHAPTER  XVH.— P.  100. 

Republicans  cover  up  the  real  cause  of  the  war.  X^ew  En- 
gland secessionists.  Their  determination  to  dissolve  the  L'nion. 
Early  and  universal  belief  in  the  right  of  secession. 

CHAPTER  XXTH.— P.   107. 
New  England's  effort  to  secede  in  1812.  1814.  and  181 5. 

CHAPTER  XIX.— P.   126. 
More  evidence  of  X^ew  England's  disunion  and  secession  work. 

CHAPTER  XX.— P.  131. 

X^ew  England's  three  hates  still  active.  The  Republican  party 
organized  1854.     Ambassador  Choate  bears  false  witness. 

CHAPTER  XXL— P.  135. 

Save  the  Union,  free  the  slaves,  the  pretext,  not  the  purpose,  of 
the  war  on  the  South.     Real  cause,  hatred  of  Democracy. 

CHAPTER   XXIL— P.    151. 
Republicans  ascend  to  power.     Lincoln  and  Seward  make  am- 
biguous speeches.     Web.ster  Davis  on  the  carnage  of  the  Avar. 
Seward's   remarkable   letter   to   Lincoln.      Nicolay   and    Hay's 
comment  on  Seward's  letter.     A  moral  j^ervcrt. 

V  i. 


CHAPTER  XXIIL— P.  i6o. 

Seward's  falsehoods.  Treachery  blacker  than  Benedict  Ar- 
nold's. Lincoln  confesses  that  he,  at  Medill's  demand,  made 
war  on  the  South. 

CHAPTER  XXIV.— P.   163. 

Greeley  opposes  war.  He  declares  the  right  of  the  South  to 
independence  and  the  right  of  secession.  Why  Lincoln  did  not 
sooner  begin  the  war.     Why  Buchanan  did  not  begin  it. 

CLIAPTER  XXV.— P.   i5». 

Almost  universal  opposition  to  war  in  the  Northern  States. 
Indiana  longs  for  peace.  Morton's  "desperate  fidelity."  "I  am 
the  State."  Congressman  Cameron's  bosh  on  the  ''life  of  the 
nation."     Nicolay  and  Hay's  bosh  on  treason. 

CHAPTER  XXVL— P.  181. 

Why  Grant  refused  to  exchange  prisoners.  Grant  compares 
Xorthern  and  Southern  soldiers.  Desertions  from  the  Union 
Army.  Riots.  Arbitrary  arrests.  "Suspects."  Thirty-eight 
thousand  men  and  women  locked  up  in  Northern  jails.  Civil 
law  overthrown.  Lincoln  disliked  and  distrusted.  The  peoples' 
indictment  in  1864.     Judiciary  opposes  Lincoln. 

CHAPTER  XXML— P.  188. 

What  a  battle  meant  to  Lincoln.  Greeley  prays  Lincoln  for 
peace.  Rosecrans  and  Halleck  on  the  peoples'  hatred  of  the 
war.  Soldiers  dislike  Lincoln.  Judge  Curtis  on  Lincoln's  usur- 
pation of  power.  Republican  writers,  Rhodes,  Moore,  Hapgood, 
Bancroft  and  others,  laud  despotism. 

CHAPTER  XXMIL— P.  199. 

Lincoln's  eagerness  for  re-election.  His  unlawful  use  of  the 
United  States  Army.  Butler  and  Dana  testify.  Lincoln's  crime 
against  the  ballot  box  and  American  freedom.  Republican  writ- 
ers unfit  teachers  of  American  boys. 

« 

CHAPTER  XXIX.— P.  209. 

Mr.  Vallandingham's  case.  Unhappy  condition  of  North- 
ern Democracy  under  despotism.  Lincoln  lays  down  the  lines 
of  despotism. 

v  i  i . 


CHAPTER  XXX.— P.   217. 
Was  the  war  waged  to  free  slaves?     Lincoln  on  the  negro. 
\'an    Buren.     Lamon's    evidence.     Wendell    Phillips.     Lincoln's 
letter   to   Greeley.     Seward's   indifference   to   the   negroes'    fate. 
Grant's  opinion.     Conway's  letter. 

CHAPTER  XXXL— P.  220. 
The  reconstruction  period.     Hate  and  cruelty. 

CHAPTER  XXXn.— P.  228. 
Hate. 

CHAPTER  XXXHL— P.  265. 
New  England's  strange  malady  of  the  mind. 


Facts  and  Falsehoods  Concerning  the 
War  on  the  South,  1861-1865. 

PART  I 

Chapter  I. 

"Abraham  Lincoln  has  Long  Since  Entered  the  Sublime  Realm 
of  Apotheosis.  Where  Now  is  the  Man  so  Rash  as  to  Warm- 
ly Criticise  Abraham  Lincoln f" — St.  Louis  Globc-Detnocral , 
March  6,  1898. 

The  above  sentence  from  one  of  the  ablest  Republican  news- 
fiapers  in  the  country  is  perhaps  a  little  terser  and  stronger  than 
the  usual  statement  regarding  the  position  Republicans  are  deter- 
mined Lincoln  shall  hold  in  the  minds  of  men,  but  truly  repre- 
sents the  reverential  attitude  which  is  held  toward  Lincoln,  not 
only  by  Republicans,  but  by  men  of  all  political  parties.  He  has 
"entered  the  realm  of  apotheosis"— to  criticise  him  unfavorably 
is  resented  by  RepubHcans  as  sacrilegious,  and  of  every  hundred, 
ninety  and  nine  either  believe  that  Lincoln  is  the  demi-god  he 
is  said  to  be,  or  they  pretend  to  believe  it,  and  go  their  wav,  thus 
giving  their  sanction  to  the  apotheosis  referred  to  by  the  Globe- 
Democrat.  Even  in  the  South  the  real  Lincoln  is  lost  sight  of  in 
the  rush  and  bustle  of  our  modern  life,  and  many  Southerners  ac- 
cept the  opinion  of  Lincoln  that  is  furnished  them  ready  made 
by  writers  who  are  either  ignorant,  or  else  who  purposely  falsify 
plain  facts  of  history.  To  such  extent  has  this  proneness  to  accept 
fiction  for  fact  gone,  this  proneness  to  take  ready-made  opinions 
from  others,  that  even  in  Mississippi  the  proposition  has  been  se- 


2  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap,  i 

rionsly  made  to  place  a  portrait  of  Lincoln  in  the  halls  of  the  State 
Capitol.  No  doubt  the  Mississippi  legislator  who  proposed  the 
Lincoln  portrait  flatters  himself  that  he  was  displaying  a  broad 
and  liberal  spirit ;  ignorant  of  the  facts,  he  believed  Lincoln  was  a 
man  of  i)i:re  and  lofty  spirit,  a  patriot  moved  by  a  noble  impulse 
to  serve  and  save  his  country,  therefore  worthy  of  Southern  as 
well  as  Northern  admiration.  Certainly  no  right  thinking  man 
would  erect  a  statue  or  put  a  portrait  in  their  legislative  hall  of 
a  self-seeking,  cunning,  coarse-minded  politician,  a  man  scorned 
by  his  own  official  family  and  by  the  most  powerful  and  prominent 
of  his  Republican  contemporaries.  Amid  the  universal  din  of 
praise  that  it  has  become  the  fashion  to  sing  of  Lincoln,  only  the 
student  remembers  the  real  facts,  only  the  student  knows  not  only 
that  the  Lincoln  of  the  popular  imagination  of  today  bears  lit- 
tle or  no  resemblance  to  the  real  Lincoln,  but  that  the  deification 
of  Lincoln  was  planned  and  carried  out  by  the  members  of  his 
own  party,  by  men  who  but  a  few  short  hours  before  Booth's 
bullet  did  its  deadly  work  at  Ford's  theater,  were  reviling  him 
as  a  buffoon,  a  coarse,  vulgar  jester.  History  affords  no  strang- 
er spectacle  than  this,  that  today,  nearly  forty  years  after  his 
death,  the  American  people,  North  and  South,  have  come  to  re- 
gard almost  as  a  god  a  man  who,  when  living,  and  up  to  the  very 
hour  of  his  death,  was  looked  upon  with  contempt  by  nearly  every 
man  of  his  own  party  who  intimately  knew  him,  even  by  members 
of  his  Cabinet,  by  Senators,  Congressmen,  preachers  and  plain  cit- 
izens. The  unthinking,  who  do  not  care  to  correct  mistaken  views 
of  historical  characters,  may  as  well  throw  this  book  aside,  but 
those  who  prefer  Facts  to  Falsehoods  will,  the  author  believes, 
feel  repaid  by  reading  on  to  the  end.  Nearly  every  statement 
will  be  substantiated  by  high  Republican  authority,  the  great  part 
made  by  the  closest  friends  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  men  who  cannot  be 
deemed  prejudiced  against  him.  In  another  issue,  the  Globe- 
Democrat  says : 

"One  thing  is  certain,  Lincoln  was  apotheosized  after 
his  death.  Had  he  lived  4000  years  ago  his  name  would  now 
be  enrolled  among  the  gods  of  Greece  and  Rome." 

The  first  part  of  this  announcement  is  true.  The  ceremony 
of  Lincoln's  apotheosis  zi'as  performed  soon  after  his  death. 
The  second  part  may  be  doubted.  The  men  of  ancient  Greece 
and  Rome  whom  their  fellow  mortals  enrolled  among  the  gods, 
were  given  that  honor,  either  for  some  bold,  bad,  or  good  achieve- 
ment. History  affords  no  instance  of  any  mortal  having  gained  god- 


Chap,  i  Facts  and  Falsehoods.    .  ^ 

ship  as  Lincoln  did.  The  men  who  bestowed  that  honor  upon 
Lincoln,  though  of  his  own  party,  though  having  known  him 
well  during  his  Presidential  life,  had  during  that  period  openly 
disliked,  despised,  and  distrusted  him,  and  had  persistently  lav- 
ished upon  him  the  most  "venomous  detractions"  the  English 
language  afforded.  These  facts  will  be  proved  by  indisputable 
evidence.  Why  the  Republican  leaders  who  had  always  "ven- 
omously vituperated"  the  living  Lincoln,  the  hour  after  his 
death  made  frantic  haste  to  perform  the  apotheosis  ceremony, 
and  hoist  their  dead  President  up  to  the  sublime  realm  of  the 
gods,  it  is  the  purpose  of  the  writer  to  show.  We  entreat  the 
reader  not  to  make  the  mistake  of  supposing  that  the  apotheosis 
ceremony  was  a  mere  holiday  afifair  gotten  up  to  amuse  or  aston- 
ish the  public.  Its  conception  was  a  flash  of  genius.  It  was  the 
last  act  of  the  dreadful  tragedy  of  war,  and  the  prelude  of  polit- 
ical plans  of  deep  and  far-reaching  importance.  The  apothe- 
osis ceremony  and  its  successful  upholding  during  all  the  years 
fthirty-eight)  since  Lincoln's  death,  has  done  more  to  prolong 
the  power  of  the  Republican  party  than  its  victories  and  con- 
quest of  the  South.  The  old  saying  that  "facts  are  stranger  than 
fiction"  is  as  true  as  it  is  trite.  The  most  fertile  fictionist  earth 
ever  produced  has  never  created  so  unique,  so  incongruous,  so 
unparalleled  a  character  as  was  Abraham  Lincoln,  mentally, 
morally  and  physically,  nor  has  the  most  inventive  ever  thought 
out  so  unexampled  a  career  as  was  his  from  cradle  to  cof- 
fin bed.  Nor  could  the  most  ingenious  romancer,  delving  in  his 
closet,  have  devised  so  original,  so  daring  a  scheme  and  so  suc- 
cessfully carried  it  out  as  that  apotheosis  ceremony,  planned  on 
the  spur  of  the  moment  by  the  Republican  leaders,  confused, 
confounded,  alarmed  as  they  were  by  the  sudden  taking-oflF  of 
their  first  President.  Although  the  writer  of  this  has  no  au- 
thentic account  of  any  secret  caucus  held  by  the  Republican 
leaders  in  ^^^ashington  City  at  the  time  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  death, 
their  entire  unity  of  action  in  the  unexpected  emergency  that 
confronted  them  is  presumptive  evidence  that  a  caucus  was 
held,  almost  before  Mr.  Lincoln's  body  was  cold ;  that  plans 
were  made  and  secret  instructions  sent  forth  to  the  foremost 
men  of  the  party,  advising  them  of  the  course  necessary  to 
pursue,  the  tone,  the  attitude,  it  was  the  duty  of  every  man  to 
assume  toward  their  dead  President.  The  men  composing  the 
caucus  saw  as  by  a  flash  of  lightning  the  vital  necessity  of  conceal- 
ing from  the  world  {hq  opinions  they  and  their  whole  party  had 


4  Facts  and  Faf-skhoods.  Ciiai'.       i 

-  < 

held  of  the  living  Lincoln.  The  preservation  of  party  power 
v^'as  their  first  thought.  They  saw  the  black  gnlf  into  which 
their  triumphant  party  would  sink  unless  swift  measures  were 
taken.  They  realized  the  fact  that  if  their  President  were 
known  to  the  world  as  they  knew  him,  the  glory  of  their  vic- 
tory would  fade  ;  as  he  stood,  so  their  party  would  stand.  If  he  was 
despised,  they  and  their  party  would  be  despised.  If  made 
public,  every  venomous  word  they  had  flung  on  the  living 
Lincoln  would  rebound  on  their  party.  To  exalt  the  dead 
President  became  the  vital  necessity  of  the  hour.  The  passion 
of  the  Republican  heart  is  to  possess  power.  They  had  won 
power  through  seas  of  blood  ;  to  lose  it  now  would  be  anguish 
to  their  very  souls.  To  exalt  .to  the  high  realm  of  godship 
the  dead  man  they  had  in  life  despised  as  the  dirt  under  their 
feet,  was  the  first  thought  that  darted  on  their  agitated  brains. 
To  bury  with  their  dead  President's  body  every  mental  and 
physical  quality  which  had  so  prominently  distinguished  him 
from  his  kind,  and  which  had  provoked  from  them  so  many 
gibes  and  jeers  and  contemptuous  flings,  was  the  first  duty 
they  saw  before  them  ;  the  next  was  to  manufacture  an  effigy 
of  their  dead  President,  clothe  it  from  head  to  heels  in  attri- 
butes the  very  reverse  of  those  the  living  President  had  been 
clothed  in,  and  then  boldly,  under  the  wide  light  of  the  Nineteenth 
Century,  start  that  effigy,  that  fake  of  their  own  creation,  down 
the  ages,  labeled: 

"Abraham  Lincoln,  First  President  of  the  Republican 
party,  the  greatest,  wisest,  godliest  man  that  has  appeared 
on  earth  since  Christ." 

The  reader  is  warned  not  to  commit  the  grievous  mis- 
take of  dismissing  this  statement  as  a  fairy  tale,  or  the  mistake 
of  fancying  that  its  truth  or  falsity  is  of  small  moment.  After 
a  close  and  critical  study  of  the  case,  the  writer  of  this  believes 
that  the  Republican  party,  •  from  the  death  of  Lincoln  to 
this  day.  is  chiefly  supported  by  the  fictions  put  forth  in  that 
apotheosis  ceremony.  These  fictions,  told  and  retold  so  often, 
have  become  almost  the  faith  of  the  world.  The  writer  holds 
that  belief  in  falsehood  is  always  injurious  to  humanity,  and 
that  the  highest  duty  we  owe  to  humanity  is  to  put  truth  in 
the  place  of  lies.  When  the  apotheosis  theory  ceases  to  govern 
historians,  and  the  real  facts  of  the  war  of  the  6o's  are  laid  before 
the  world.  Republican  history  of  the  war  will  sink  out  of  sight  as 
worthless  rubbish. 


Chaf'.  2  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


Chapter  II. 
A  Glance  07'er  the  Country's  Situation  at  the  Moment  of  Lincoln's 
Death.  Republicans'  Drunken  Joy.   Their  Vindictive  Policy. 
They  Fear  and  Distrust  Andrezv  Johnson. 

Tlie  awful  war  was  cikIccI  ;  the  South  had  surrendered  her 
anus  and  lay  prostrate  at  her  conqueror's  feet,  bleeding  at  every 
pore.  Her  soldiers  (those  not  buried  on  battlefields)  were  slowly 
wending-  their  way  over  their  devastated  country  toward  their  de- 
vastated homes,  shoeless,  ragged,  hungry,  as  they  had  so  often  been 
while  bravely  fronting  and  fighting  the  foe ;  they  trudged  onward 
and  Southward  sadder  than  night  itself.  How  dififerent  their  con- 
(iuerors!  These  were  feeding  themselves  fat  at  the  grand  feast 
of  success ;  were  quaffing  deep  of  the  wine  of  victory.  Lamon. 
the  constant  companion  of  Lincoln,  has  left  on  record  the  story 
of  Lincoln's  iov.     Lamon  savs  : 

"Everybody  was  happy ;  the  President's  spirits  rose  to  a 
height  rarely  witnessed  :  he  was  unable  to  restrain  himself." 
So  unable,  the  irascible  Stanton  called  him  to  order,  with  a 
severe  reprimand,  as  will  be  related  later  on.     Lamon  says: 

"An  informal  Cabinet  meeting  was  held,  and  how  to  dis- 
pose of  the  traitors  was  discussed.  Most  of  the  members 
were  for  hanging  them.  Lincoln  was  then  asked  for  his  opin- 
ion and  replied  by  relating  a  story. 

"I  once,"  said  Lincoln,  "saw  a  boy  holding  a  coon  by  a 
string.  'What  have  you  got?'  I  asked.  'It's  a  coon,'  re- 
plied the  boy-  'Last  night  Dad  cotched  six  coons.  He  killed 
them  all  but  this  poor  little  cuss.  Dad  told  me  to  hold  him 
till  he  got  back,  and  Fm  afeared  he's  going  to  kill  this  one 
too.  Oh,  I  do  wish  he'd  get  away.'  'Why  don't  you  let  him 
loose?'  I  asked.  'If  I  let  him  loose  Dad'll  give  me  hell.' 
said  the  boy.  'Now,'  said  Lincoln,  'if  Jefif  Davis  and  the 
other  fellows  will  only  get  away  themselves  it  will  bo  all  right. 
but  if  I  catch  them  and  let  them  loose,  Dad'll  give  me  hell.'  "  • 

It  was  Lincoln's  nature  to  make  light  of  the  crudest  trage- 
dies, to  find  amusement  in  the  awfulest  horrors.  The  anguish, 
the  agonies  of  the  four  years'  war,  the  slaughter  of  700,000  men 
who  wore  the  blue,  and  more  than  half  as  many  who  wore  the 
grav.  Lincoln  could  jovial! v  liken  to  catching  six  coons,  the  killing 
of  five,  and  the  captivity  of  one.  Not  one  particle  of  pity  went 
out  to  the  condition  of  the  conquered.     On  the  contrary,  their 


6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       2 

thoughts  and  energies  were  at  work  devising  plans  to  still  further 
make  wretched  their  conquered  foe.  In  all  the  long  and  woeful 
history  of  man's  inhumanity  to  man,  I  know  of  nothing  to  equal 
the  virulence,  the  vindictiveness  of  hate  manifested  by  Republican 
leaders  after  the  South's  surrender. 

■'We've  got  'em  down  at  last !"  was  the  exultant  boast. 
"What  next?"  "They  are  ours  by  the  law  of  conquest,"  said 
another,  "ours  to  rule  as  conquerors  rule."  "We'll  grind 
them  down  to  the  very  mire  of  degradation,"  said  another. 
"We'll  crush  every  atom  of  rebel  spirit  from  their  rebel 
hearts.  We'll  wipe  out  their  State  lines  and  make  territories 
under  military  rulers  ;  w^e'll  confiscate  their  land,  cut  it  up  into 
forty-acre  lots,  and  give  it  to  the  negroes.  We'll  enfranchise 
the  blacks,  disfranchise  the  whites,  and  set  ex-slaves  masters 
over  ex-masters."  "But,"  said  another,  "Fve  heard  it  whis- 
pered that  the  President  means  to  be  merciful  to  the  Rebs." 
"The  President!"  was  the  sinister  rejoinder.  "In  the  future, 
as  in  the  past,  our  will,  not  his,  be  done." 

Even  as  they  spoke  the  sound  of  Booth's  bullet  smote  upon 
their  ears  and  for  a  moment  they  were  dumb.  True,  they  had 
never  loved  their  first  President.  True,  they  had  scorned  him 
and  reviled  him,  but  they  knew  him,  knew  how  far  they  could 
move  him  to  go  their  way.  They  never  forgot  that  before  his 
election  to  the  Presidency  he  had  in  a  speech  in  Con- 
gress declared  the  right  of  secession,  the  right  of  the  South 
to  independence,  and  they  knew  how  the  imperialists  of 
their  party  had  easily  induced  him  to  recede  from  secession 
and  State  rights,  and  take  up  the  imperial  idea  that  seces- 
sion is  a  monstrous  political  crime,  to  punish  which  war  was  in- 
augurated and  the  whole  Southland  drenched  in  blood.  This  pli- 
able President  was  dead;  how  would  it  be  with  his  successor? 
Could  they  put  the  bit  in  his  mouth  and  guide  him  the  way  they 
intended  to  go?  Andrew  Johnson  was  to  them  an  unknown  quan- 
tity. Would  he  be  willing  to  wipe  out  State  lines  in  the  South  and 
set  over  the  people  military  rulers.  Would  he  adopt  the  policy  of 
confiscation?  Would  he  see  the  utility  of  sinking  the  white  men 
and  women  of  the  South  into  a  deeper  degradation  than  the  yellow 
race  on  the  Pacific  coast  are  held  in  by  the  white?  Putting  a 
proud  people,  accustomed  to  dominance  and  freedom,  imder  the 
black  heels  of  savages  from  Africa  would  he  a  feat  of  such  su- 
preme and  unspeakable  despotism  as  neither  pagan  or  Christian 
conquerors  ever  before  attempted.     This  feat  they  were  determin- 


Chap.  2  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  7 

ed  to  accomplish.  They  knew  tliat  Andrew  Johnson  was  a  rene- 
gade from  the  South.  They  knew  that  he  had  been  born  and  reared 
in  the  school  of  Democracy,  which  they  hated  and  despised.  They 
knew  he  had  played  traitor  to  the  State  of  his  birth,  to  the  party 
which  had  honored  him  with  the  highest  office  in  the  State.  Thev 
knew  in  the  awful  time  which  tried  the  souls  of  his  people  he  had 
been  false  to  them,  false  to  kith  and  kin  and  blood,  had  fled  north- 
ward and  thrown  himself  into  the  arms  of  their  deadliest  foes. 
They  knew  when  their  first  President  let  slip  the  bloody  dogs  of 
war,  the  triple  traitor  from  Tennessee  had  sicked  on  those  dogs, 
shouting  as  they  leaped  southward : 

"On.    Lion!      On,    Wolf!    On,    Tiger!    Catch!    Tear! 
Devour !" 

They  well  knew  Johnson's  treachery  to  his  own  people  had 
left  a  gulf  between  him  and  them,  a  grewsome  gulf  filled  with  the 
blood  and  bones  of  slaughtered  men.  Could  any  bridge  span  a 
gulf  like  that  ?  Would  not  that  gulf  forever  hold  the  traitor  from 
Tennessee  aw'ay  from  his  own  people,  his  own  country?  Why 
then  did  fear  steal  upon  their  souls  ?  They  had  heard  it  said  that 
"the  teachings  of  childhood  are  never  wholly  obliterated." 
What,  if  in  some  secret  recess  of  Johnson's  heart  one  spark,  one 
single  spark  of  Democracy's  fire  was  left?  What  if  that  spark 
should  revive?  Should  glow  with  life?  Should  break  into 
flame?  Should  flare  backward  over  the  four  years  of  Republican 
rule?  Backward,  shedding  a  lurid  light  over  the  horrors,  the 
agonies,  the  anguish  of  the  thousand  battlefields,  and  the  rivers  of 
blood?  Over  the  moans  and  groans  of  the  wounded  and  dying? 
All  these  lay  along  the  track  of  the  four  years  of  war.  Added 
to  these  were  the  outrages  to  freedom,  free  speech  stifled,  the 
press  choked  breathless,  the  Constitution  kicked  into  the  Capitol 
cellar,  habeas  corpus  bound  hand  and  foot,  the  Supreme 
Court  set  aside  as  naught,  the  old  Bourbon  infamy,  letres-de- 
cachet,  resurrected  from  the  ruins  of  the  Bourbon  Bastile,  and 
brought  to  this  country  to  rule  in  the  North  as  it  ruled  in  France 
300  years  ago ;  38,000  of  its  victims  yet  lay  in  dungeon  cells. 
What  if  these  sights  and  sounds  should  stir  the  heart  of  that  trait- 
or from  Tennessee  and  he  should  come  to  feel  that  blood  is  thick- 
er than  water,  and  his  strong  right  arm  should  strike  forth  com- 
mandingly,  and  his  strident  voice  say  to  them,  the  conquerors: 
"It  is  enough  !     Stay  now  thine  hand." 

Could  they  bear  this  from  the  renegade  Democrat  of  Ten- 
nessee? Was  not  the  South  theirs  by  the  law  of  conquest? 
Theirs  by  the  decree  of  the  god  of  war?     Before  their  excited 


8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       3 

minds  flashed  the  possibiHty  of  many  things.  What  if  speech  and 
press  should  be  again  freed?  What  if  the  words  of  contempt, 
the  vituperations,  the  abusive  epithets  they  had  so  viciously 
hurled  upon  their  President  while  he  was  alive,  with  which  the  air 
in  and  around  Washington  was  thick,  should  be  seized  by  a 
freed  press,  pilloried  in  a  thousand  columns  and  sent  broadcast 
over  the  world  ?  Would  not  their  party  shrivel  under  the  expos- 
ure? It  is  said  in  the  face  of  great  danger  Thought  acts  with 
lightning  speed.  Hardly  had  those  alarmed  Republicans  asked  of 
one  another,  "How  escape  the  avalanche  of  calamities  that 
threaten  us?"  ere  the  road  to  safety  was  lumined  before  their 
eyes.  The  apotheosis  project  was  devised  and  so  successfully 
carried  out,  even  Democrats  of  the  South  and  of  the  North  are 
taken  in  by  its  falsehoods  and  often  join  Republicans  in  singing 
praises  to  the  man  whom  in  life  his  own  party  scorned  and  de- 
rided. 


Chapter  III. 

The  Apotheosis  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  Its  Cause  and  Effect. 

McClure  and  other  Republican  writers  inform  us  that  two 
men,  Mr.  William  H.  Herndon  and  Ward  H.  Lamon,  from  youth 
up,  were  the  closest  friends  to  Mr.  Lincoln,  were  trusted  friends 
in  the  days  of  Lincoln's  poverty  and  insignificance,  devoted, 
grateful  friends  in  the  days  of  his  power  and  high  fortune.  Both 
Herndon  and  Lamon  wrote  a  biography  of  the  man  they  loved. 
The  highest  Republican  authorities  testify  that  these  two  men  pro- 
duced by  far  the  best  story  of  Lincoln's  life  ever  published.  Not 
a  man  has  ever  denied  or  doubted  the  honesty,  fairness  or  truth 
of  these  two  writers.  I  am  particular  in  this  matter,  as  I  shall 
quote  liberally  from  these  authors.  McClure's  Lincoln,  page -46, 
has  this : 

"Lamon  was  selected  by  Mr.  Lincoln  to  accompany  him 
to  Washington  City,  as  a  protector  from  assassination.  Mr. 
Lincoln  appointed  Mr.  Lamon  United  States  Marshal  of  the 
District  of  Columbia,  that  he  might  always  have  him  at 
hand."  Schouler  (good  Republican  authority)  in  his  His- 
tory says,  "Lamon,  as  Marshal,  made  himself  the  bodyguard 
of  the  man  he  loved." 

During  his  stay  in  Washington  City,  Lamon  was  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's closest  friend ;  into  his  ears  Lincoln  poured  all  his  little 


Chap.   3  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  9 

and  big  troubles.  Lamon  has  left  an  account  of  the  curious  pro- 
ceedings which  took  place  immediately  after  Lincoln's  death. 
We  extract  the  following: 

"The  ceremony  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  apotheosis  was  planned 
and  executed  by  men  who  were  unfriendly  to  him  while  he 
lived.  The  deification  took  place  with  showy  magnificence ; 
men  who  had  exhausted  the  resources  of  their  skill  and  in- 
genuity in  venomous  detractions  of  the  living  Lincoln  were 
the  first,  after  his  death,  to  undertake  the  task  of  guarding 
his  memory,  not  as  a  human  being,  but  as  a  god." 

On  another  page  Lamon  gives  specimens  of  the  "venomous 
detractions"  which  the  apotheosizers  of  the  dead  Lincoln  had 
lavished  on  the  living.  Members  of  the  Cabinet  were  in  the 
habit  of  referring  to  President  Lincoln  as — 

"The  baboon  at  the  other  end  of  the  avenue." 
Senators  referred  to  him  as — 

"That  damned  idiot  in  the  White  House." 
Other  specimens  of  "venomous   detractions"   will  be  given 
later  on.     Of  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  Lamon  continues  thus : 

"There  was  the  fiercest  rivalry  as  to  who  should  can- 
onize Mr.  Lincoln  in  the  most  solemn  words ;  who  should 
compare  him  to  the  most  sacred  character  in  all  history.  He 
was  prophet,  priest  and  king,  he  was  Washington,  he 
was  Moses,  he  was  likened  to  Christ  the  Redeemer,  he  was 
likened  unto  God.  After  that  came  the  ceremony  of 
apotheosis." 

And  this  was  the  work  of  men  who  never  spoke  of  the  living 
Lincoln  except  with  jeers  and  cbntempt.  Lamon  says  this  "ven- 
omous detraction"  was  known  to  Mr.  Lincoln ;  the  detractors 
took  no  pains  to  conceal  it  until  after  Lincoln's  death,  when  it 
became  a  political  necessity  to  pose  him  as  the  "greatest,  wisest, 
godliest  man  that  ever  lived."  Of  the  way  such  detractions 
wounded  Mr.  Lincoln's  feelings,  Lamon  speaks  as  follows : 

"Mr.  Lincoln  was  so  outraged  by  the  obloquies,  so 
stung  by  the  disparagements,  his  existence  was  rendered  so 
unhappy,  that  his  life  became  almost  a  burden  to  him.  I 
went  one  day  to  his  office  and  found  him  lying  on  the  sofa, 
greatly  distressed.  Jumping  to  his  feet,  he  said:  'You 
know,  Lamon,  better  than  any  living  man,  that  from  my  boy- 
hood up  my  ambition  wae  to  be  President,  but  look  at  me ; 
I  wish  I  hftd  never  been  born !     I  would  rather  be  dead  than 


lo  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.   3 

as  President  thus  abused  in  the  house  of  my  friends.'  The 
tragic  death  of  Mr.  Lincoln  brought  a  more  fearful  panic  to 
his  traducers  than  to  his  friends." 

The  reason  of  this  is  plain.  The  few  true  friends  about  Mr. 
Lincoln  were  not  politicians.  Lamon  loved  Lincoln  for  himself, 
faults  and  all,  and  possibly  for  the  favors  bestowed  upon  him. 
The  Republican  politicians  about  him  detested  Lincoln  personal- 
ly and  had  little  or  no  respect  for  his  mental  ability,  but  the  mo- 
ment after  Lincoln's  death  they  saw  how  disastrous  it  would  be 
for  their  party  and  themselves  should  the  public  come  to  know 
of  the  low  estimate  in  which  they  had  held  their  first  President. 
Continuing  the  apotheosis  subject,  Lamon  makes  the  following 
remarkable  statement: 

"For  days  and  nights  after  the  President's  death  it  was 
considered  treason  to  be  seen  in  public  wdth  a  smile  on  your 
face.  Men  who  ventured  to  doubt  the  ineffable  purity  and 
saintliness  of  Lincoln's  character,  were  pursued  by  mobs  of 
men.  beaten  to  death  with  paving  stones,  or  strung  up  by  the 
neck  to  lamp  posts  until  dead." 

Who  were  the  men  back  of  these  crimes?  Who  were  they 
who  in  secret  conclave  decreed  that  a  smile  on  the  face  should  be 
punished  as  high  treason?  Who  w^ere  they  whose  fine  diplomatic 
art  contrived  to  gather  mobs  on  the  street  and  then  stirred  them 
up  to  the  madness  of  beating  men  to  death  with  paving  stones  or 
hanging  them  on  lamp  posts  until  dead?  For  what  object  were 
these  desperate  measures  resorted  to?  The  Republican  writers 
inform  us  that  almost  without  exception,  every  Republican  wdio 
knew  Mr.  Lincoln  personally,  not  only  failed  to  see  his  greatness, 
but  w^ere  so  impressed  by  his  littleness  as  to  be  anxious  to  depose 
him.  and  put  a  dictator  in  his  place.  B.  F.  Butler,  in  his  book, 
says  several  men  w^ere  talked  of  for  the  dictatorship.  Edwin 
Stanton  more  than  once  proposed  to  General  McClellan  to  seize 
the  reins  of  government  and  make  himself  dictator.    Butler  says : 

"There  was  a  crop  of  dictators ;  each  party  wanted  the 
man.  The  zealous  abolitionists  wanted  Fremont.  The  prop- 
erty men  of  the  country  wanted  a  property  man.  The  X'ew 
York  Times,  in  an  elaborate  editorial,  proposed  that  George 
Law,  an  extensive  manufacturer  of  New  York,  should  be  dic- 
tator." 

Lamon  says  Line  Din  was  well  posted  as  to  these  dictator 


Chap.  3  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  ii 

plots.  So  widespread  was  the  dissatisfaction  with  Lincoln,  so 
hig:h  and  influential  were  the  men  en,c:ac:ed  in  the  plots,  no  man  at 
the  time  offered  any  ohjection.  no  man,  no  Republican  paper 
Cthat  we  can  learn  of)  dcnoiMiced  the  project  as  treason,  or  the 
projectors  as  traitors.  No  man  iirs^ed,  in  opposition,  the  ability 
and  fitness  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  At  that  time,  as  all  through  the 
dreadful  four  years'  war,  the  word  "traitor"  was  bv  Republi- 
cans only  applied  to  men  who  did  not  advocate  the  war  of  con- 
quest on  the  South.  The  slightest  word  indicating  a  belief  that 
the  war  was  not  just  or  was  unnecessarily  cruel,  was  enough  to 
brand  a  man  as  a  traitor  deserving  a  dungeon  cell.  Among  the 
distinguished  men  who  distru.sted  Lincoln's  ability,  who  scorned 
and  reviled  him,  were  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  Salmon  P. 
Chase.  Secretary  of  War  Edwin  Stanton.  Vice  President  Hanni- 
bal ITamlin,  Secretary  of  State  Seward.  Fremont.  Senators  Simi- 
ncr,  Tnunbull.  Ben  Wade,  of  Ohio,  Henry  Wilson,  of  Massa- 
chusetts, Thaddeus  Stevens.  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  Wendell  Phil- 
lips. Winter  Davis,  Horace  Greeley.  Chandler  of  ?^Tichigan.  and 
hosts  of  others-  Yet  all  of  these  (with  the  exception  of  Greeley) 
immediately  after  the  apotheosis  ceremony  deemed  it  for  the 
good  of  their  part}'  and  themselves  to  bury  out  of  sight  every  "ve- 
nomous detraction"  they  had  lavished  on  the  living  President  and 
forthwith  to  put  themselves  into  a  reverential  attitude  toward  the 
dead  man  and  force  upon  the  world  the  belief  that  Lincoln  had 
been  their  wise  and  trusted  ruler,  their  guide,  their  head,  their 
Moses  who  had  led  them  out  of  the  awful  W^ilderness  of  War.  So 
far  as  I  can  discover.  Greelev  was  the  only  Republican  \vho  did 
not  make  a  sudden  jump  from  distrust  and  contempt  to  adoration. 
Zack  Chandler,  of  Michigan,  who  had  much  to  do  with  pushing 
Lincoln  on  to  coercion,  was  among  the  number  who  were  eager 
to  depose  Lincoln  and  put  a  dictator  in  his  place.  It  was  Chand- 
ler, who,  before  it  became  evident  that  Lincoln  was  determined  on 
war,  while  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  people  in  the  Northern 
States  denounced  the  bare  idea  of  coercion,  wrote  these  sinister 
words : 

"This  Union  will  not  be  worth  a  curse  without  a  little 
blood-letting." 

Although  Lincoln  had  gratified  Chandler  by  letting  the  blood, 
and  dav  by  day  was  still  letting  it  from  thousands  of  brave  young 
hearts.  Chandler  was  dissatisfied  and  wanted  Lincoln  removed  and 
a  dictator  put  in  his  place. 


12  Facts  axd  Fai.sehoods.  Chap. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  Estimate  Republican  Leaders  Held  of  the  Living  Lincoln 

In  his  history  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  R'..  page  520,  Rhodes 
makes  the  sweeping  assertion  that — 

"Lincohi's  contemporaries  failed  to  perceive  his  great- 
ness."' 

Other  Republican  writers  make  the  same  statement.  Yet 
none  attempted  to  explain  why  those  who  best  knew  Mr. 
Lincoln  failed  to  esteem  or  respect  him.  Chase,  while  in  his 
Cabinet,  had  every  opportunity  to  know  Lincoln  well.  Tarbell 
says : 

"Mr.  Chase  was  never  able  to  realize  Mr.  Lincoln's 
greatness."  * 

McClure  savs : 

"Chase  was  the  most  irritating  fly  in  the  Lincoln  oint- 
ment." 

Tu  their  voluminous  life  of  Lincoln,  Nicolay  and  Hay  have 
this : 

"Even  to  complete  strangers  Chase  cotdd  not  write  with- 
out speaking  slightingly  of  President  Lincoln.  He  kept  up 
this  habit  till  the  end  of  Lincoln's  life.  Chase's  attitude  to- 
ward the  President  varied  between  the  limits  of  active 
brutality  and  benevolent  contempt." 

Yet  Nicolay  and  Hay,  and  all  other  Republican  writers, 
rate  Mr.  Chase  very  high  as  a  man  of  honesty,  talent,  and  patriot- 
ism. The  reader  must  bear  in  mind  that  every  Republican 
writer  since  the  year  i860  uses  the  word  "patriotism"  in  a  per- 
verted sense,  not  as  meaning  love  of  country,  but  meaning  ap- 
probation of  the  war  made  on  the  South.  To  a  Republican,  op- 
position to  that  war  was  treason,  support  of  it  was  patriotism. 
The  worst  scoundrel  that  ever  lived,  if  he  eulogized  that  war,  was 
patriotic.  Had  St.  Peter  himself  returned  to  earth  and  even  hint- 
ed that  war  was  cruel  and  unnecessary,  he  would  have  been 
called  a  traitor  and  confined  in  a  dungeon  cell.  Of  a  bill  to 
create  offices  in  1864.  Chase  wrote  in  his  diary: 

"If  this  bill  becomes  a  law,  Lincoln  will  most  certain- 
ly put  men  in  office  from  political  considerations." 


Chap.  4  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  13 

On  this,  page  448,  Rliodes  comments  thus : 

"A  President  who  selected  unfit  generals  for  the  reason 
that  they  represented  phases  of  public  opinion,  would  hardly 
hesitate  to  name  postmasters  and  collectors  who  could  be  re- 
lied upon  as  a  personal  following." 

This  is  as  near  as  Rhodes  dare  come  in  adverse  criticism  of 
the  apotheosized  man.     Rhodes  further  says : 

"In  conversation,  in  private  correspondence,  in  the  confi- 
dence of  his  diary.  Chase  dealt  censure  unrestrained  on  Lin- 
coln's conduct  of  the  war." 

Morse  says : 

"Many  distinguished  men  of  his  own  party  distrusted 
Mr.  Lincoln's  character." 

On  an  ofiicial  visit  to  Washington,  February  23,  1863,  Richar  " 
H.  Dana  wrote  Thomas  Lathrop  as  follows : 

"I  see  no  hope  but  in  the  army  ;  the  lack  of  respect  for 
the  President  in  all  parties  is  unconcealed.  The  most  strik- 
ing thing  is  the  absence  of  personal  loyalty  to  the  Presi- 
dent. It  does  not  exist.  He  has  no  admirers.  If  a  conven- 
tion were  held  tomorrow  he  would  not  get  the  vote  of  a 
single  State.  He  does  not  act  or  talk  or  feel  like  the  ruler  of 
an  empire.  He  seems  to  be  fonder  of  details  than  of  princi- 
ples, fonder  of  personal  questions  than  of  weightier  matters 
of  empire.  He  likes  rather  to  talk  and  tell  stories  with  all 
sorts  of  people  who  come  to  him  for  all  sorts  of  purposes, 
than  to  give  his  mind  to  the  many  duties  of  his  great  post. 
This  is  the  feeling  of  his  Cabinet.  He  has  a  kind  of  shrewd 
common  sense,  slip-shod,  low-leveled  honesty  that  made  him  a 
good  Western  lawyer,  but  he  is  an  unutterable  calamity  to 
us  where  he  is.     Only  the  army  can  save  us." 

This  was  the  way  Mr.  Dana  and  many  other  RepublicanF 
saw  Mr.  Lincoln  before  the  apotheosis  ceremony.  After  tha: 
ceremony  the  Honorable  S.  E.  Crittenden  expressed  dee[' 
regret  that — 

"The  men  whose  acquaintance  wath  Mr.  Lincoln  was  in- 
timate enough  to  form  any  just  estimate  of  his  character  did 
not  more  fully  appreciate  his  statesmanship  and  other  great 
qualities.  They  did  not  recognize  him  as  the  greatest  states- 
man and  writer  of  the  times." 


14  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       4 

Is  It  not  a  little  singular  that  neither  Crittenden  or  any  other 
Republican  writer  has  made  any  attempt  to  explain  the  phenom- 
enon, that  despite  Mr.  Lincoln's  greatness  and  goodness  not  one, 
so  far  as  I  can  discover,  of  his  contemporaries  perceived  those 
qualities  while  he  lived?  The  New  York  Indepoidcnt,  a  strong 
Republican  journal,  in  its  issue  of  August  9th,  1862,  thus  com- 
mented on  Lincoln's  state  papers: 

"Compare  the  state  papers,  messages,  proclamations,  or- 
ders, documents,  which  preceded  or  accompanied  the  War  of 
Independence,  with  those  of  President  Lincoln's  papers. 
These  are  cold,  lifeless,  dead.  There  has  not  been  a  line  in 
any  government  paper  that  might  not  have  been  issued  by 
the  Czar  of  Russia  or  by  Louis  Napoleon   of  France." 

The  state  papers  of  the  War  of  Independence  were  inspired 
by  the  highest,  the  most  generous  emotion  of  the  human  heart- 
love  of  freedom.  The  state  papers  of  President  Lincoln  were  in- 
spired by  the  meanest,  the  most  sellish — the  pubsion  for  conq..c^t. 
Is  it  strange  that  in  tone  and  spirit,  Lincoln's  state  papers  should 
resemble  those  of  the  Czar  of  Russia?  Both  men  stood  on  a 
despot's  platform. 

■■(Jur  state  papers,"  continues  the  New  York  Indepoid- 
cnt, "during  this  eventful  period  (the  war  of  conquest  on 
the  South)  are  void  of  genius  and  enthusiasm  for  the  great 
doctrine  on  which  this  government  was  founded.  Faith  in 
human  rights  is  dead  in  Washington." 

Never  spoke  journal  a  more  lamentable  truth.  P"aith  in  hu- 
man rights  was  not  only  dead  in  Washington,  but  the  Gov- 
ernment in  Washington  was  using  all  the  machinery  in  its  power 
to  trample  down  that  faith  deep  in  bloody  mire  on  a  hundred 
battlefields.  The  Washington  Government  had  gone  back  a 
hundred  years  to  the  old  monarchic  doctrines  of  George  III.,  and 
was  doing  its  utmost  to  quell  and  kill  the  patriotic  spirit  of  '76, 
which  had  rescued  the  Colonies  from  kingly  rule-  Dunning, 
President  of  Columbia  L^niversity,  in  one  of  his  essays  on  the 
Civil  War  (the  war  of  conquest  on  the  South),  says,  page  39: 

"President  Lincoln's  proclamation  of  September  24th, 
1862,  was  a  perfect  plat  for  a  military  despotism.  The 
very  demonstrative  resistance  of  the  people  to  the  govern- 
ment only  made  military  arrests  more  frequent.  Lincoln 
asserted  the  existence  of  military  law  throughout  the  United 
States." 


Chap.  4  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  15 

The  President  of  Columbia  University  miglit  have  gone 
a  Httle  farther  back  and  found  that  the  plat  Lincoln  made  for 
a  military  despotism  was  when  he  called  for  75,000  armed  men  to 
invade  and  conquer  the  States  of  the  South.  The  Rev.  Robert 
Collier,  a  distinguished  dvine  of  Chicago,  was  on  a  visit  tc; 
Washington  City. 

"The  Rev.  Mr.  Collier,"  says  Lamon,  "sharing  the 
prevailing  sentiment  in  regard  to  the  incapacity  and  ineffi- 
ciency of  Lincoln's  government,  chanced  to  pass  through  the 
White  House  grounds.  Casting  a  glance  at  the  Executive 
Mansion,  he  saw  three  pairs  of  feet  resting  on  the  ledge  of  an 
open  window  on  the  second  floor.  Calmly  surveying  the 
grotesque  spectacle,  Mr.  Collier  asked  a  man  at  work  about 
the  grounds  'What  that  meant?'  pointing  to  the  six  feet  in 
the  window.  'You  old  fool!'  retorted  the  man,  ^tliat's 
the  Cabinet  a  settin'  and  them  big  feet  is  old  Abe's.'  " 

Some  time  after,  in  a  lecture  at  Boston,  Mr.  Collier  described 
the  scene  and  commented  on  the  imbecility  of  the  Lincoln  gov- 
ernment : 

"Projecting  their  feet  out  of  a  wandow  and  jabbering 
away  is  about  all  they're  good  for  in  Washington,"  said 
the  great  preacher. 

The  reader  will  observe  the  first  line  of  this  quotation : 
"Mr.  Collier,  sharing  the  prevailing  sentiment  in  regard  to 
Mr.  Lincoln's  incapacity." 

This  sentiment  prevailed  up  to  the  hour  of  Lincoln's  death. 
As  soon  as  the  apotheosis  ceremony  was  performed,  the  Rev. 
Collier  made  haste  to  assume  toward  Lincoln  an  attitude  of  rev- 
erence and  admiration. 

"I  abused  poor  Lincoln  like  the  fool  the  man  called  me," 
said  Mr.  Collier. 

Charles  Francis  Adams  wrote  of  the  living  Lincoln : 

"When  Lincoln  first  entered  upon  his  functions  as  Presi- 
dent, he  filled  with  dismay  all  those  brought  in  contact  with 
him." 

« 

The  dismay  did  not  abate  as  the  years  went  by ;  on  the  con- 
trary, the  opposition  to  Lincoln,  the  distrust,  the  disgust,  in- 
creased from  day  to  day  to  the  hour  of  his  death.  Tn  1873  ex- 
Minister  Adams  made  an  address  to  the  Legislature  of  New  York 
on  the  occasion  of  Seward's  death.     On  page  48  Adams  said: 

"When  Lincoln  entered  upon  his  duties  as  President  he 


i 


i6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       5 

displayed  moral,  intellectual  and  executive  incompetency." 

.    So  far  as  I  can  discover,  not  during  Lincoln's  life  did  any 

noted     Republican     state     that     he     displayed    anything     else. 

Ji-ne  20th    Richard  H.  Dana,  in  the  New  York   World,  wrote 

thus: 

"I  have  had  several  iirterviews  with  Lincoln,  Seward, 
Blair,  Stanton,  Wells  and  Chase.  They  all  say  dreadful 
things  of  each  other,  all  except  Seward.  They  are  all  at 
sixes  and  sevens.  I  cannot  describe  Lincoln.  He  was  so- 
bered in  his  talk ;  told  no  extreme  stories.  You  feel  for  him 
a  kind  of  pity,  feeling  that  he  has  some  qualities  of  great 
value,  yet  fearing  his  weak  points  may  make  him  wreck 
something." 


CHAPTER  r. 

I  Fend  ell  Phillips'  Estimate  of  Lincoln.  Secretary  of  War  Stan- 
ton's Opinion.  The  Wade  and  Winter  Davis  Manifesto. 
Stanton's  First  Interviezv  With  Lincoln..  His  Insulting 
Treatment  of  Lincoln.  McClcllan's  Letters  to  His  Wife. 
Lincoln  Reads  Artemus  Ward  at  Cabinet  Meeting.  Chase's 
Disgust.  Lincoln's  Hilarity.  Why  Did  Lincoln  Appoint 
Stanton  Cabinet  Ministcrf  Seward  on  United  States  Con- 
stitution.    Stanton  Bullies  Lincoln. 

Not  only  in  private  life  but  in  public  speeches  did  Wendell 
Phillips  speak  of  President  Lincoln  in  the  most  uncompliment- 
■•;ry  terms.  On  August  i,  1862,  W^endell  Phillips  said  to  his  au- 
'  Hence: 

"As  long  as  3'OU  keep  the  present  turtle  (Lincoln)  at 
the  head  of  affairs  you  make  a  pit  with  one  hand  and  fill 
it  with  the  other.  T  know  Mr.  Lincoln.  I  have  been  to 
Washington  and  taken  his  measure.  He  is  a  first-rate  sec- 
ond-rate man ;  that  is  all  of  him.  He  is  a  mere  convenience 
and  is  waiting,  like  any  other  broomstick,  to  be  used." 

In  a  speech  made  at  Music  Hall,  New  Haven,  1863,  Phil- 
ips said: 

"Lincoln  was  badgered  into  emancipation.  After  he  is- 
sued it  he  said  it  was  the  greatest  folly  of  his  life.  It  was 
like  the  Pope's  bull  against  the  comet." 

In  a  speech  in  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  Wendell  Phillips 
said  to  his  larjre  audience: 


Chap.  5  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  17 

"With  a  man  for  President  we  should  have  put  down 
the  rehellion  in  ninety  days." — Logic  of  History,  page  12. 
Wendell  Phillips,  at  a  Republican  meeting  in  Boston,  called 
to  express  disgust  at  the  conduct  of  the  Government,  said: 

"President  Lincoln,  with  senile,  lick-spittle  haste,  runs 
before  he  is  bidden,  to  revoke  the  Hunter  proclamation. 
The  President  and  the  Cabinet  are  treasonable.  The  Presi- 
dent and  the  Secretary  of  War  should  be  impeached." 

In  .1864,  in  a  speech  at  Cooper  Institute,  Phillips  de- 
nounced Lincoln's  despotic  acts  in  the  strongest  possible 
terms.     Phillips  said: 

'T  judge  Mr.  Lincoln  by  his  acts,  his  violation  of  the 
law,  his  overthrow  of  liberty  !n  the  Northern  States.  I 
judge  Mr.  Lincoln  by  his  words  and  deeds,  and  so  judging, 
I  am  unwilling  to  trust  Abraham  Lincoln  with  the  future 
of  this  country.  Mr.  Lincoln  is  a  politician  ;  politicians  are 
like  the  bones  of  a  horse's  fore  shoulder ;  not  a  straight  one 
in  it.  I  am  a  citizen  watchful  of  constitutional  lib- 
erty. Are  you  willing  to  sacrifice  the  constitutional  rights 
of  sevent}^  years?  A  man  in  the  field  (the  army)  said: 
'The  re-election  of  Lincoln  will  be  a  national  disaster.'  An- 
other said :  'The  re-election  of  Lincoln  will  be  national 
destruction.'  I  want  free  speech.  Let  Abraham  Lincoln 
know  that  we  are  stronger  than  Abraham  Lincoln  ;  that  he 
is  the  servant  to  obey  us." 

August  5,  1864,  Henry  AVinter  Davis  and  Senator  Wade 
of  Ohio  issued  a  very  bitter  manifesto  against  President  Lin- 
coln, charging  him  with — 

"A  more  studied  outrage  on  the  legislative  authority 
of  the  people  than  was  ever  before  perpetrated." 

When  Lincoln  was  asked  if  he  had  seen  this  speech  of  Phil- 
lips and  the  Winter  Davis-Wade  manifesto  against  him,  he  re- 
plied : 

"I  have  seen  enough  to  satisfy  me  that  I  am  a  failure, 
not  only  in  the  opinion  of  the  people  in  the  rebellion,  but 
of  many  distinguished  politicians  of  my  own  party." — La- 
mon's  Recollections,  page   187. 

This  occurred  only  a  short  time  before  Lincoln's  death.  Of 
all  Mr.  Lincoln's  "venomous  detractors/'  Stanton  was  the  most 
venomous.  It  seems  that  Stanton  first  met  Lincoln  in  Cincin- 
nati,  in    1858.     Stanton  and   Lincoln   both   gave   an   account  of 


i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       5 

that   meeting-.     Stanton    told   the    story   to    General    Don    Piatt 
who  relates  it  as  follows: 

"A  few  minutes,"  said  Stanton,  "before  I  went  to  the 
trial  of  the  McCormack  case  I  met  INIr.  Lincoln  for  the 
first  time.  He  had  been  retained  to  assist  in  the  case  and 
called  on  me.  I  saw  a  long,  lank  creature.  He  wore  a 
dirty  linen  duster  for  a  coat,  on  the  back  of  which  the  per- 
spiration from  his  armpits  had  splotched  two  wide  stains, 
which  met  at  the  center  and  resembled  a  dirty  map  of  the 
continent.  "I  said."  snorted  Stanton,  "that  if  that  o^iraffe  ap- 
peared in  the  case  I  would  throw  up  my  brief  and  leave." 
Lamon  gives  the  story  as  Lincoln  gave  it  to  him. 

"On  first  meeting  Stanton,"  Lincoln  said,  "he  treated 
me  so  rudely  I  went  out  of  the  room  ;  saAv  ]\IcCormack 
and  told  him  I  should  have  to  withdraw  as  his  counsel  in 
the  case,  stating  the  reasons  therefor.  McCormack  went 
in  and  remonstrated  with  Stanton.  "I  will  not."  said  Stan- 
ton, scornfully,  "associate  with  such  a  damned  gawky,  long- 
armed  ape.  If  I  can't  have"  a  man  who  is  a  gentleman  in 
appearance  I  will  abandon  the  case." 

Lincoln  was  in  the  ■  next  room  and  heard  every  word. 
When  McCormack  returned,  Lincoln  refunded  his  fee  and  left 
for  Urbana,  Illinois,  where  he  related  the  occurrence  to  his  broth- 
er lawyers.  Stanton's  disgust  toward  Lincoln  never  abated  during 
Lincoln's  life.  He  never  referred  to  him  except  as  "that  gorilli 
at  the  White  House,"  or  "that  ourang  outang  at  the  other  end  of 
the  avenue."  Before  Stanton  was  appointed  to  the  Cabinet,  he 
was  in  the  habit  of  visiting  General  McClellan.  In  McClellan's 
Life  a  number  of  letters  to  his  wife  are  published,  in  which  Mc- 
Clellan speaks  of  Stanton's  visits.     In  one  he  wrote  thus: 

"The  most  disagreeable  thing  about  Stanton  is  the  ex- 
treme virulence  of  his  abuse  of  President  Lincoln,  his  whole 
administration,  as  well  of  all  the  Republican  party.  I  am 
often  shocked." 

In  another,  McClellan  writes : 

"Stanton  never  speaks  of  the  President  in  any  way 
other  than  as  "that  original  gorilla."  He  often  says:  "DuChail- 
lie  was  a  fool  to  wander  all  the  way  to  Africa  in  search  of 
what  he   could  have   found   in   Springfield,   Illinois." 

In  another,  McClellan  writes : 

"J^othing  can  be  more  bitter  than  Stanton's  words  and 


Chap.  5  Facts  a.xd  Falsehoods.  19 

manner  when  speaking  of  the  President  and  his  administra- 
tion. He  gives  them  no  credit  for  honesty  of  purpose  or  pa- 
triotism, and  very  seldom  for  abiHty.  He  often  advises  the 
propriety  of  my  seizing  the  government  and  taking  power  in 
my  own  hands." 

In  another  letter  McClellan  writes : 

"Stanton  often  speaks  of  the  painful  imbecility  of  the 
President." 

In  McClure's  Life  of  Lincoln,  page  150,  is  this: 

"Before  Stanton  was  appointed  Secretary  of  War  he 
was  an  open  and  malignant  opponent  of  the  Lincoln  admin- 
istration. He  often  spoke  to  public  men,  military  and  civil, 
with  withering  sneers  of  Lincoln.  I  have  heard  him  speak 
thus  of  Lincoln,  and  several  times  to  him  in  the  same  way." 

"After  Stanton  left  Buchanan's  Cabinet  he  maintained 
close  confidential  relations  with  Buchanan,  kept  up  a  con*, 
spondence,  and  in  some  of  his  letters  he  expressed  the  utmost 
contempt  for  Lincoln.  In  some  of  his  letters,  published  in 
Curtis"  Life  of  Buchanan,  Stanton  speaks  freely  of  the  "pain- 
ful imbecility  of  Lincoln,  of  the  venality  and  corruption  that 
ran  riot  in  the  Government.'  It  is  an  open  secret  that  Stan- 
ton advised  the  overthrow  of  the  Lincoln  Government,  to 
be  replaced  by  McClellan  as  a  military  dictator.  These  let- 
ters published  by  Curtis,  bad  as  they  are,  are  not  the  worst 
letters  written  by  Stanton  to  Buchanan.  Some  of  them  are 
so  violent  in  expression  against  Lincoln  they  have  been  char- 
itably withheld  from  the  public." 

—  (See  Minor's  Real  Lincoln.) 

In  "On  Circuit  With  Lincoln,"  page  428,  Whitney  tells  of 
these  suppressed  letters.  Hapgood's  Lincoln,  page  164,  refers 
to  Stanton's  brutal  absence  of  decent  personal  feeling  towards 
Lincoln,  and  tells  of  his  insulting  behavior  when  they  met  five 
years  earlier,  of  which  meeting  Stanton  said : 

"I  met  Lincoln  at  the  bar  and  found  him  a  low,  cunning 
clown." 

McClure  say-s  Stanton  had  little  respect  for  Lincoln's  fitness 
for  the  Presidency,  yet  to  ^Ir.  Buchanan  during  his  Presidency 
Stanton  showed  an  excess  of  deference.  Air.  Buchanan,  in  a  let- 
ter to  his  niece.  Miss  Harriet  Lane,  complained  that  Stanton, 
when  in  his  Cabinet,  "was  alwavs  on  my  side  and  flattered  me 


20  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       5 

ad  nausexim."  (See  Minor's  Real  Lincoln.)  Yet  in  the  very 
teeth  of  all  this  evidence  showing  how  the  foremost  Republicans 
indulged  in  "grotesque  descriptions"  of  Lincoln's  person,  some 
of  his  historians  have  the  gall  to  charge  such  descriptions  to 
Southern  people. 

"Grotesque  descriptions,"  says  the  truthful  (  ?)  Morse, 
"of  Mr.  Lincoln  had  long  been  rife  among  the  Southerners,  as 
if  he  had  been  a  Caliban  in  education,  manners  and  aspect, 
whose  conversation  would  be  redolent  of  the  barn  yard  and 
pigsty." 

If  such  descriptions  were  rife  in  the  South  they  were  bor- 
rowed from  Republican  sources.  Was  it  a  Southern  man  who 
always  referred  to  President  Lincoln  as  "the  gorilla  in  the  White 
House?"  or  "that  baboon  at  the  other  end  of  the  avenue?"  Was 
it  any  man  in  the  South  who  called  Lincoln  "that  long-armed 
ape?"  and  refused  to  act  with  him  in  a  law  case?  Was  it  any 
man  in  the  South  who  talked  of  "Lincoln's  painful  imbecility?" 
Was  it  the  governor  of  a  Southern  or  New  England  State  who 
said  that  "Lincoln  retailed  stories  so  obscene  he  left  his  pres- 
ence in  disgust?"  Was  it  a  Northern  or  Southern  minister  who 
left  the  East  Room,  after  interviewing  Lincoln,  "with  a  sicken- 
ing sensation  of  despair  that  such  a  man  was  in  such  a  position?" 
Is  it  not  time  Republican  writers  should  pay  a  little  regard  to 
truth?  They  know  well  that  the  men  of  the  South  had  little  or 
no  opportunity  to  know  Lincoln  personally.  Was  Mr.  JMorse 
really  ignorant  on  this  subject?  Had  he  never  heard  of  the  "ven- 
omous detractions"  lavished  on  the  living  Lincoln  by  men  of  his 
own  party?  Or  did  he  know,  but,  to  carry  out  the  apotheosis 
scheme,  think  it  his  duty  to  charge  those  detractions  to  South- 
ern people?  The  most  revolting  story  told  of  Lincoln  (with 
the  exception  of  the  comic  song  he  called  for  on  the  field  of  bat- 
tle) is  related  by  General  Piatt,  who  had  it  direct  from  Chase. 
It  is  known  that  the  Emancipation  proclamation  was  finally  put 
forth  as  a  war  measure.  The  days  were  very  dark  for  the  Union 
army.  The  Southern  chiefs  were  still  victorious  on  every  field. 
Rivers  of  human  blood  continued  to  flow  on  battlefields.  The 
hospitals  in  Washington  were  crowded  with  mutilated,  wounded, 
dying  Union  soldiers.  At  this  juncture  Lincoln  hoped  the  issue 
of  an  Emancipation  proclamation  would  put  new  life  into  the 
Union  army,  would  turn  the  tide  of  disaster  antl  bring  victory  to 
his  troops.  The  proclamation  was  written.  The  Cabinet  was 
called  to  hear  and  consider  it.     The  members  met  in  solemn  con- 


Chap.  5  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  21 

clave.  President  Lincoln  entered ;  in  his  hand  not  the  procla- 
mation, 1)iit  a  copy  of  Artenuis  Ward's  latest  "funny  book."  Mr. 
Lincoln  opened  at  the  first  page  and  read  on  and  on,  almost  to 
the  very  last,  amid  roars  of  laughter  from  every  Cabinet  minister 
except  Chase,  who  sat  silent,  w^ith  solemn,  reproving  visage. 
Now  and  then  Mr.  Lincoln  would  look  up  from  Ward's  "funny 
page"  at  Chase's  solemn  face  and  break  into  louder  guffaws  of 
hilarity,  followed  by  the  boisterous  guffaws  of  all  his  Cabinet  ad- 
visers except  Chase.  General  Piatt  says  that  "Chase's  inveterate 
dislike  of  Lincoln's  jokes  and  stories  was  a  source  of  great 
amusement  to  Mr.  Lincoln  and  the  other  members  of  his  Cabi- 
net, and  that  Lincoln  seldom  lost  an  opportunity  to  entertain 
himself  and  them  in  that  direction." 

"Both  Stanton  and  Chase,  "  says  General  Piatt,  "de- 
scribed these  occasions  to  me  :  Chase  with  an  aggrieved  tone, 
Stanton  with  hilarious  laughter.  The  reader  may  judge  of 
their  sort  when  I  state  that  scarcely  one  of  Lincoln's  stories 
would  bear  printing." 

On  a  previous  page  we  have  shown  Stanton's  angry  disgust 
on  seeing  Lincoln's  dirty  linen  duster.  Soap  and  water  can  wash 
dust  away ;  no  amount  of  soap  and  water  will  wash  away  mental 
and  moral  foulness.  Stanton  turned  up  his  nose  at  the  dust,  but 
laughed  hilariously  at  Lincoln's  moral  foulness.  Lincoln's  ap- 
pointment of  his  bitterest  enemy,  and  the  bitter  enemy  of  the  Re- 
publican party,  to  the  high  office  of  Cabinet  Minister  not  only 
astonished,  it  angered  Republicans.  It  was  well  known  that  Stan- 
ton all  his  life  had  called  himself  a  Democrat,  had  served  the 
Democratic  party  as  Cabinet  Minister  during  President  Buchan- 
an's administration,  and  had  always  professed  to  be  a  pro-slavery 
man.  While  in  Mr.  Buchanan's  Cabinet,  Stanton  had  accepted 
the  opinion  expressed  by  President  Buchanan  and  his  constitution- 
al advisers,  that  neither  the  President  or  Congress  had  any  con- 
stitutional right  to  coerce  seceding  States.  Knowing  such  were 
the  opinions  Stanton  professed,  why  did  Lincoln  put  him  in  his 
Cabinet?  This  was  the  question  of  the  hour.  Hapgood  says  of 
Stanton's  appointment: 

"No  man  not  a  Southern  rebel  had  less  right  to  expect 
office  from  Lincoln  than  Stanton.  Most  men  who  had  ex- 
pressed the  opinions  held  by  Stanton  would  have  had  scruples 
of  delicacy  about  coming  in  close  relationship  of  confidential 
adviser  with  the  object  of  their  contempt.  No  scruple  de- 
layed Stanton  :  his  acceptance  was  prompt." 


22  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.       5 

Stanton  accepted  office  because  he  wanted  place  and  power  ; 
he  had  no  principles  to  stand  in  his  way.  Always  eag-er  to  eulo- 
gize the  man  his  party  had  deified.  Tlaiigood  calls  Lincoln's  ap- 
pointment of  Stanton  "brilliant  magnanimitv."'  This,  however, 
is  only  apotheosis  twaddle  to  which  Republican  writers  resort  to 
support  the  theor\  of  Lincoln's  divinity.  Those  who  knew  Mr. 
Lincoln's  mental  and  moral  peculiarities  explain  the  real  reasons 
which  made  him  show  more  favors  to  enemies  than  to  those  whi> 
had  faithfully  worked  for  him.  The  following  is  Herndon's  ex- 
planation : 

"Lincoln  always  gave  more  to  his  enemies  than  to  his 
friends.  In  the  close  calculations  of  attaching  the  factions 
to  himself  he  counted  on  the  affection  of  his  friends  to  serve 
him  and  tried  to  appease  his  enemies  by  gifts.  There  was 
always  truth  in  the  charge  of  his  friends  that  he  failed  to  re- 
ciprocate their  devotion  with  favors  ;  adhesion  to  his  interests 
was  what  Lincoln  wanted.  If  he  got  adhesion  gratuitiouslv 
he  never  wasted  his  gifts  paying  for  it." 

Herndon  bluntly  says  in  his  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln : 

"Lincoln  had  no  gratitude.  He  accepted  the  services  of 
his  friends  as  his  due,  and  never  thought  of  making  any  re- 
turns." 

Morse,  Vbl.   i.  page  -^^ly,  says: 

"Stanton  carried  his  revilings  of  the  President  to  the 
point  of  coarse,  personal  insults." 

On  another  page  Morse  speaks  of  Stanton's  "habitual   in- 
sults."    Lincoln  knew  of  these  insults,  yet  when  it  was  determin- 
ed that  Cameron  should  vacate  the  Caljinct,  Lincoln  said  to  Chase: 
"I  know  that  Stanton  dislikes  me,  but  T  wish  to  see  him. 
Ask  him  to  call  and  see  me." 

Stanton  called,  and  after  some  talk,  Lincoln  said: 

"The  office  of  Secretary  of  War  will  soon  be  vacant. 
Will  you  accept  it?" 

.Stanton  was  dumfounded.  This  "long-armed  ape,"  this 
"gorilla,"  this  "baboon,"  whom  he  had  so  bitterly  scorned  and 
reviled,  offered  him  one  of  the  highest  offices  in  his  gift.  On  re- 
covering his  breath,  Stanton  did  not,  like  the  surprised  maiden, 
blush  and  say:  "This  is  so  sudden,"  but  he  said  something  very 
like  it. 

"You  take  me  by  surprise.  Will  you  give  me  a  day  to 
consider  it?" 


CiiAT.  6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  2t, 

Hap^ood  says  he  promptly  accepted.  General  Piatt,  who 
well  knew  Stanton,  was  so  astonished,  he  said  to  him  : 

"How  can  you  reconcile  your  contempt  for  Lincoln,  and 
vour  widely  different  views  on  politics,  with  service  under 
iiim  ?" 

Stanton  evaded  reply,  but  Piatt,  who  worshipped  Stanton's 
success,  as  it  was  his  nature  to  worship  successful  uicn  and  suc- 
cessful measures,  and  who  believed  that  God  had  called  Stanton, 
as  well  as  Lincoln,  to  the  front,  undertakes  to  explain  why  an  old 
Democrat,  who,  under  Buchanan,  liad  believed  the  South  had  a 
rig-ht  to  independence,  was  now  willing  to  serve  a  President  and 
l^arty  which,  as  was  declared  a  thousand  times  during  the  war, 
were  determined  to  "crush,  conquer,  kill  or  annihilate"  the  whole 
people  of  the  South  on  the  ground  that  they  had  no  right  to  leave 
llie  L^nion. 

"Stanton,"  said  Piatt,  "saw  the  absurdity  of  holding  the 
Union  by  the  rotten  rail  of  a  Virginia  abstraction." 

The  "Virginia  abstraction"  meant  the  United  States  Con- 
stitution, concerning  which  Seward  had  given  Piatt  a  lesson. 

"We  are  bound  to  the  tail  of  a  paper  kite,"  said  Seward 
to  Piatt,  "called  the  Constitution.  A  written  Constitution 
is  dangerous  to  us  of  the  North.  The  South  is  using  it  as 
a  shield." 

The  Constitution  7^'as  dangerous  to  "us  ( the  Republican  par- 
ty)  of  the  North."  It  stood  in  the  way  of  that  party's  imperial 
policy  of  conquest.  The  Republican  party  kicked  the  Constitu- 
tion into  the  Capitol  cellar  to  clear  the  way  for  conquest. 

CHAPTER  V  I. 

.  I    JVestern  Rep.ubHcan  Paper  Propounds  the   True   Republican 
Doctrine. 

The  Lemars  (la.)  Sentinel.  1S79,  fearlessh-  pro]:)()unded  Re- 
publican doctrines. 

"Xo  reasonable  man,"'  said  the  Sentinel,  "will  say  that 
President  FUichanan  was  wrong  when  he  said  that  the  North 
had  no  constitutional  right  to  coerce  seceding  States,  but  what 
of  that?  I'p  ium])ed  AI)raham  Lincoln,  the  rail-splitter, 
and  kicked  the  Constitution  into  the  Capitol  cellar,  and  call- 
ed for  75,000  armed  men  to  march  down  and  c(>n(|uer  the 
South,   and   when   the  75,000  proved  not  enough,   the   rail- 


24  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.      6 

splitter  called  for  more,  and  more,  until  he  had  over  2,000,- 
000  armed  men,  and  he  sent  'em  down  to  burn  and  pillage,  to 
kill,  conquer  or  annihilate  traitors  to  our  g-lorious  Union,  the 
Constitution  all  the  while  in  the  Capitol  cellar." 

Although  every  intelligent  man  in  the  Republican  party 
knows  that  their  party  despised  the  Constitution,  still  as  the  great 
body  of  the  North's  people  had  not  lost  love  and  reverence  for  it, 
few  Republicans  openly  denounced  it.  Wendell  Philips,  Lloyd 
Garrison,  and  other  bold  men,  time  and  again,  had  publicly  de- 
novmccd  the  Constitution  and  shouted  aloud  their  desire  to  tear 
it  in  pieces.  Beecher,  from  his  pulpit,  contemptuously  called  the 
Constitution  a  "sheep  skin"  government  deserving  no  respect. 

If  the  Republicans  were  puzzled  to  understand  why  Lincoln 
f^assed  by  staunch  men  of  his  own  party  to  favor  Stanton,  thev 
were  at  no  loss  to  understand  why  Stanton  accepted  office  from  the 
man  he  despised.     Piatt  says : 

"Stanton  and  Seward  rioted  in  the  use  of  power." 

The  souls  of  both  these  men  were  filled  with  the  evil  passion 
for  power.  Before  Stanton's  accession  to  office,  why  did  he  so 
assiduously  pay  court  to  General  McClellan  ?  Why  use  his  utmost 
endeavor  to  inspire  McClellan  with  scorn  and  contempt  for  Lincoln 
and  his  government?  Why  insidiously  flatter  McClellan?  Why 
urge  him  to  sieze  in  his  own  hands  the  reins  of  Government  and 
make  himself  supreme  dictator?  In  this  dictator  scheme  did 
Stanton  see  a  chance  for  himself  to  achieve  power?  Certain  it 
is,  Stanton's  frequent  visits  to  McClellan.  his  confidential  outpour- 
ings, his  flatteries,  his  desire  to  see  McClellan  make  himself  dic- 
tator, all  stopped  short  the  very  day  Stanton  accepted  place  and 
power  from  Lincoln.  From  that  day  Stanton  turned  the  cold 
shoulder  on  McClellan  and  reveled  in  the  power  his  office  gave 
him. 

In  Lamon's  Recollections  of  Lincoln,  page' 198,  is  this: 

"It  was  generally  believed  that  President  Lincoln  ab- 
jectly endured  the  almost  insulting  domination  of  Secretary 
of  War  Stanton." 

On  page  233  Lamon  says : 

"There  was  a  prevailing  opinion  that  Stanton  at  times  ar- 
bitrarily refused  to  obey  or  carry  out  President  Lincoln's 
orders." 

Lamon  so  loved  Lincoln,  anything  detracting  from  his  glory 
annoyed  him.     He  denies  that  Lincoln  was  governed  by   Stan- 


Chap.  6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  25 

ton,  yet,  being  of  a  garrulous  turn  of  mind,  and  honestly  believing 
that  the  whole  world  is  interested  in  any  and  every  incident  of 
Lincoln's  life,  Lamon  often  relates  incidents  which  directly  con- 
tradict his  own  previous  assertions.  The  following  story,  to  the 
ordinary  understanding,  goes  to  show  that  Stanton  played  the 
master  over  Lincoln : 

"On  the  night  of  March  3rd,  1865,"  relates  Lamon, 
"Mr.  Lincoln,  with  several  members  of  his  Cabinet,  was  at 
the  Capitol  waiting  the  final  passage  of  bills  by  Congress  in 
order  that  the  President  should  sign  them.  Everybody  seem- 
ed happy  at  the  prospect  of  peace.  A  dispatch  from  General 
Grant  was  handed  to  Stanton,  who  read  it,  and  handed 
it  to  the  President.  The  telegram  advised  Stanton  that 
Grant  had  just  received  a  letter  from  General  Lee,  request- 
ing an  interview,  with  a  view  to  re-establishing  peace  between 
the  sections.  The  dispatch  was  read  by  others  of  the  par- 
ty. Mr.  Lincoln's  spirits  rose  to  a  height  rarely  witnessed. 
He  was  unable  to  restrain  himself  from  giving  expression  to 
the  natural  impulse  of  his  heart.  He  was  in  favor  of  grant- 
ing lenient  and  generous  terms  to  the  defeated  foe.  Mr. 
Stanton  fell  into  a  towering  rage ;  he  also  could  not  restrain 
himself.  Turning  on  the  President,  his  eyes  flashing  fire,  he 
cried  angrily :  'Mr.  President,  you  are  losing  sight  of  the 
consideration  at  this  juncture,  how  and  by  whom  is  this  war 
to  be  closed?  Tomorrow  is  inauguration  day.  Read  again 
that  dispatch.  Don't  you  appreciate  its  significance? 
if  \ou  arc  not  to  be  President  of  an  oliedient  and  loyal  peo- 
ple, vou  ought  not  to  take  the  oath  of  ofiice.  You  are  not 
a  proper  person  to  be  empowered  to  so  high  a  trust.  You 
should  not  consent  to  act  in  the  capacity  of  a  mere  figure- 
head. If  terms  of  peace  do  not  emanate  from  you,  and  do 
not  imply  that  you  are  supreme  head  of  the  Nation,  you  are 
not  needed.  By  doing  thus  you  will  scandalize  every  friend 
you  possess.'  " 

How  did  the  President  of  the  Ignited  States  receive  this 
severe  castigation  ?  This  insolent  bullying  from  his  Cabinet 
member?  Did  he  freeze  him  with  cold  displeasure?  Did  he 
resent  with  grave  dignity?  Did  he  break  out  in  hot  anger? 
Nothing  of  the  sort.  President  Lincoln  accepted  his  inferior  of- 
ficer's scolding  with  the  submissiveness  which  comes  from  an 
inferior  to  a  superior. 

Lamon  concludes  the  stor\-  thus: 


26  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       6 

"Mr.  Lincoln  sat  silent  at  the  table  for  a  few  min- 
utes, then  he  said:  'vStanton,  you  are  right.  The  dispatch 
did  not  strike  me  at  first  as  I  now  consider  it'  Then 
taking  pen  and  paper  Mr.  Lincoln  wrote  a  dispatch,  handed 
it  to  Stanton,  requesting  him  to  sign,  date  and  send  it  to 
Grant." 

In  this  scene  which  man  played  the  part  of  a  snubbed  and 
scolded  school-boy?  Which  the  part  of  an  irascible  school-mas- 
ter who  had  caught  the  boy  misbehaving  himself?  Yet  poor 
Lamon's  judgment  was  so  befogged,  his  eyes  so  bedazzled  by 
the  glare  of  Lincoln's  wonderful  success,  he  could  neither  think 
nor  see  straight.  On  one  page  he  tells  his  readers  that  his 
friend,  his  "benefactor,  Lincoln,"  was  always  the  masterful  and 
guiding  spirit,  that  even  the  bad-tempered  Secretary  of  ^^'ar 
was  submissive  and  reverential  to  Lincoln.  A  page  or  two  after 
he  gives  us  a  picture  of  his  great  man  in  the  character  of  a 
whipped  school-boy.  It  has  been  said  a  hundred  times  that  the 
mitimely  taking  off  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  woeful  misfortune  to" 
the  Southern  people ;  that  had  Lincoln  lived  through  a  second 
term  the  South  would  have  been  spared  the  horrors  of  the  re- 
construction period.  This  has  been  told  so  often,  many  North 
and  South  have  come  to  believe  it.  It  is  quite  possible  that  Mr. 
Lincoln  would  have  l)een  satisfied  with  the  return  of  peace  and 
the  entire  surrender  of  the  Southern  army.  There  is  nothing 
in  Lincoln's  historv  to  show  tliat  his  heart  had  become  gangremd 
wnth  hate  of  Southern  people,  as  was  the  case  with  some 
others.  He  had  longed  for  victory,  for  peace,  for  a  second 
term — these  three  things  had  come  to  him  and  filled  his  heart 
with  joy.  But,  would  these  have  satisfied  the  men  wlio  would 
have  been  around  Lincoln?  Andrew  Johnson  attempted  to  carry 
out  the  policy  it  was  supposed  that  Lincoln  had  decided  on, 
but  the  foremost  men  of  the  Republican  party  opposed  that  pol- 
icy. Johnson's  persistence  came  near  losing  him  his  office  and 
his  life  as  well.  The  great  body  of  Republican  leaders  came 
to  hate  Johnson  because  of  his  more  merciful  policy  full  as 
intensely  as  they  hated  Jefferson  Davis.  The  question  is,  was 
it  Lincoln's  nature  to  have  successfully  resisted  the  pressure  the 
leading  men  of  his  own  party  would  have  brought  to  bear  on 
him?  Could  they  not  easily  have  forced  Lincoln  to  yield  and 
adopt  their  cruel  policy  of  treating  the  South  ?  \\' hen  we  con- 
sider how  the  leaders  felt  toward  Mr.  Lincoln,  luiw  little  respect 
and  esteem  they  entertained  for  him.  liow  imbecile  and  itiferior 
they  believed  him  to  be,  it  does  not  seem  at  all  proliaI)Ie  that  tkey 


Chap.  6  Facts  and  Fai.sehoods.  27 

would  have  yielded  their  dpinions  to  his.  Thoug-h  not  want- 
only cruel,  thouo-h  not  of  a  nature  to  seek  pleasure  by  causing 
human  sufferin.q-.  Lincoln  had  little  or  no  pity  for  i)ain.  Unlike 
r..  \\  Butler  and  Sherman,  Lincoln  did  not  find  gleeful  delight 
in  the  power  to  humiliate,  torment,  and  torture  the  men  and  wo- 
men of  the  South  whti  were  utterly  at  his  mercy.  It  does  not 
appear  that  by  nature  Cirant  was  despotic  or  unusually  cruel,  yet 
to  serve  his  ambition  he  l)ecame  the  tool  of  others  who  were 
cruel.  The  reader  must  have  noticed  these  lines  in  Lamon's 
story  of  Lincoln  and  Stanton,  just  related: 

"Lincoln's  spirit  rose  to  a  height  rarely  wituessed  ;  he 
was  unable  to  restrain  himself  from  giving  expression  to 
the  natural  impulse  of  his  heart.  He  was  in  favor  of 
granting  lenient  and  generous  terms  to  the  defeated  foe. 
Air.  Sfanfoii  fell  info  a  tozvcring  rage:  he  could  not  re- 
strain himself;  tnrning  on  the  President,  his  eyes  flashing  fire, 
he  said,  etc." 

What  so  angered  Stanton  ?  Stanton  was  not  only  a  sav- 
age, ill-tempered  man,  but  he  delighted  in  cruelty.  Did  he  fall 
into  that  towering  rage  because  Lincoln  was  in  favor  of  granting 
lenient  and  generous  terms  to  the  South  ?  Was  it  of  this  leniency 
that  Lincoln  so  swiftly  repented  and  submitted  himself  to  the  dom- 
inance of  the  savage  and  cruel  "Stanton?  If  this  was  not 
the  cause  of  Stanton's  sudden  anger,  it  might  possibly  have 
sprung  from  pure  irritability.  The  reader  may  remember  Stan- 
ton's unnecessary  fit  of  ill  temper  on  seeing  Lmcoln  arrayed  in 
a  dusty  linen  coat.     Lamon  says : 

"Lincoln  was  unable  to  restrain  himself ;  his  spirits  rose 
to  a  height  rarely  witnessed." 

The  actions  of  a  very  uncouth  man,  even  under  happy  ex- 
citement, may  be  very  rasping  to  the  irritable  nerves  of  a  cross, 
savage  tempered  man.  Was  it  something  of  this  sort  that  threw 
Stanton  into  that  towering  rage?  Illustrative  of  the  oddities  of 
Lincoln's  character,  and  the  curious  effect  joy  sometimes  pro- 
( hired  upon  him,  we  offer  a  little  story  taken  from  Butler's  T.ook. 
After  Fort  Hatteras  was  captured  by  the  L'nion  forces  Gen- 
eral Butler  was  so  eager  to  be  the  first  to  carry  the  good  news  to 
1  .incoln,  he  set  off  for  Washington  City  and  arrived  there  late  at 
uight.  Accompanied  by  Assistant  Secretary  of  the  Navy  Mr. 
Fox,  they  drove  rapidly  to  the  White  House,  roused  the  night 
watchman,  sent  a  servant  to  rouse  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  the  two 
men.  Fox  and  lUitler,  went  into  the  Cabinet  room  to  await  his 


28  .         Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       6 

coming.  Mr.  Lincoln  did  not  take  time  to  dress.  He  entered  in 
his  night  gown,  barefooted.  Bntler  conchides  the  story  as  fol- 
lows: 

"Everybody  knows  how  tall  Lincoln  was  (six  feet  four 
inches)  ;  he  seemed  much  taller  in  that  night  shirt.  (Fox  was 
five  feet  nothing.)  Fox  told  the  joyous  story,  whereupon  he 
and  Lincoln  fell  into  each  other's  arms  ;  that  is,  Fox  threw 
his  arms  around  Lincoln  about  as  high  as  the  hips.  Lin- 
coln reached  down  over  Fox  until  his  long  arms  were  nearly 
to  the  floor;  thus  holding  each  other  they  began  a  waltz, 
flying  round  and  round ;  the  night  shirt-tail  was  so  agi- 
tated it  fluttered  in  the  breeze  like  a  flag  of  joy.  I  was  so 
overcome  by  the  spectacle  I  lay  back  on  the  sofa  and  roared 
with  laughter." 

The  reader  may  remember  Herndon's  description  of  the 
night  gowns  Lincoln  usually  wore : 

"Long,  narrow,  yellow  flannel  things  which  struck  him 
just  above  his  knobby  knees.  A  young  lawyer,"  says  Hern- 
don,  "on  seeing  Mr.  Lincoln  for  the  first  time  in  one  of  those 
yellow  flannel  gowns  was  almost  paralyzed." 

Morse  wants  it  believed  that  Lincoln  appointed  Stanton  to 
ofiice  because  of  his  peculiar  fitness.  There  is  not  the  least  ev- 
idence that  Stanton  had  ever  manifested  such  fitness,  unless,  in- 
deed, Lincoln  fancied  Stanton's  scorn  and  contempt  for  him, 
his  Cabinet,  and  party  were  signs  of  fitness. 

Morse  (page  328)  thus  describes  Stanton's  ability  for  the 
ofiice  Lincoln  gave  him : 

"Stanton's  abilities  command  some  respect,  though  his 
character  never  excited  either  liking  or  respect.  In  his 
dealings  with  men  he  was  capable  of  much  duplicity ;  he  was 
arbitrary,  harsh  and  bad-tempered.  He  often  committed 
acts  of  injustice  and  cruelty  for  which  he  rarely  made 
amends,  and  still  more  rarely  seemed  disturbed  by  any  re- 
morse or  regret.  These  traits  bore  hard  on  individuals,  but 
ready  and  unscrupulous  cruelty  was  supposed  to  be  useful 
in  war.  Lincoln  is  the  only  ruler  in  history  who  could  for 
years  have  co-operated  with  such  a  man  as  Stanton." 


Chap.  6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  29 

What  an  admission  is  this!  "Ready  and  unscrupulous  cru- 
elty supposed  to  he  useful"  Was  it  Pope's,  Sherman's,  Sheri- 
dan's, Brownlow's,  Butler's  "ready,  unscrupulous  cruelty"  which 
recommended  them  to  Lincoln's  favor?  Was  it  McClellan's  less 
cruel  nature  which  lost  him  the  favor  of  Lincoln,  of  Seward, 
and  Stanton?  McClellan's  orders  show  that  he  wanted  to  ob- 
serve the  customs  of  war  as  established  by  civilized  peoples. 
The  above  named  army  officers,  except  McClellan,  reveled  in  cru- 
elty. 

Morse  (page  376)  continues: 

"From  Stanton's  snug  personal  safety  (in  his  office, 
supposed  to  be  very  dear  to  him)  he  delivered  gross  insults 
to  the  highest  generals  in  the  Union  army." 

In  Gen.  Don  Piatt's  "Men  Who  Saved  the  Union,"  he  says : 

"Without  an  exception  Stanton  was  more  subject  to 
personal  likes  and  dislikes  than  any  man  ever  called  to 
public  station.  Both  Stanton  and  Seward  were  drunk  with 
lust  of  power.  They  fairly  rjoted  in  its  enjoyment.  Stanton 
used  the  fearful  power  of  the  Government  to  crush  those 
he  hated,  and  used  the  same  to  elevate  those  he  loved. 
His  official  business  became  a  personal  affair." 

Rosecrans  unintentionally  offended  the  ego  of  this  despot 
in  the  Cabinet  and  Stanton's  spite  followed  him  through  the 
whole  war.  Piatt  says  Stanton  gave  Rosecrans  first  neglect  and 
then  cruel  punishment  and  abuse. 

"Stanton,"  says  Piatt,  "grew  furious  almost  to  insan- 
ity over  the  failure  of  his  generals.  Stanton  was  impa- 
tient, tyrannical  and  often  unjust.  Stanton  left  few  friends 
in  the  administration ;  his  unfortunate  manner  offended  the  * 
officers  of  the  army  and  irritated  the  politicians.  General 
Grant  hated  him  and  tried  to  put  Stanton  on  record  as  an 
imbecile," 

Notwithstanding  Stanton's  dislike  and  scorn  of  Lincoln  up 
to  the  hour  of  his  death,  Republicans  relate  that  Stanton 
stood  by  the  dying  Lincoln,  and  after  the  last  breath  left  his  body 
Stanton  reverentially  turned  his  eyes  up  to  heaven  as  he  solemn- 
ly said:     "He  now  belongs  to  the  ages." 


30  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap. 


Chapter  J'll. 

Grant  and  JVashburn  Defy  Lincoln's  Authority.  U^ashburn  Bul- 
lies Lincoln.  A  United  States  Senator  Bullies  Mr.  Lin- 
coln. Senator  JJ'ade  Storms  at  Him.  Hale  in  the  Senate 
Assails  Him.  Rcz\  Mr.  Fuller's  Unfavorable  Opinions  of 
Lincoln.     Li), coin's  Trickery. 

"Lincoln,"  says  Lamon,  "had  given  to  Mr.  Joseph 
Mattox  and  to  General  Singleton  permits  and  passes 
through  the  line  to  bring  cotton  and  other  Southern  pro- 
ducts from  Virginia.  Washburn  heard  of  it,  called  im- 
mediately on  the  President  and  threatened  to  have  Genera! 
Grant  countermand  the  permits  if  Lincoln  would  not  re- 
voke them.  ]\Ir.  Lincoln  replied:  'I  do  not  believe  Grant 
would  take  upon  himself  the  responsibility  of  such  an  act.' 
'I  will  show  you,  sir,  '  cried  Washburn,  excitedly.  'I  will 
show  you  whether  Grant  will  do  it  or  not.'  \\^ashburn  ab- 
ruptly withdrew  and  by  the  next  boat  left  Washington 
for  Grant's  headquarters,  and  soon  returned,  and  so  likewise 
did  ^lattox  and  Singleton.  Grant  had  countermanded  the 
permits.  This  was  a  source  of  exultation  to  Mr.  Wash- 
burn and  his  friends  and  of  corresponding  surprise  and 
mortification  to  the  President.  'I  wonder,'  said  he  'when 
General  Grant  changed  his  mind  on  this  subject?  Grant 
was  the  first  man  to  give  permits  for  the  passage,  and  to  his 
own  father.'  " 

Sometime   after    Mr.    Lincoln    referred    to   the    matter   and 
said : 

"It  made  me  feel  my  insignificance  keenly  for  the  mo- 
ment, but  if  my  friends  Washburn.  Henry  Wilson  and  others 
derived  anv  pleasure  from  a  victorv  over  me.  let  them  enjoy 
it." 

Does  this  story  indicate  that  the  men  in  his  own  partv  re- 
spected or  feared  Mr.  Lincoln  ?  How  would  \\'ashington  or 
Jackson  or  an}-  other  President  have  borne  disrespectful  treat- 
ment from  inferior  officers?  ( )n  i:)agc  27,c)  of  Lamon's  Recol- 
lections he  tells  another  anecdote  showing  how  little  Lincoln's 
contemporaries  respected  and  esteemed  him : 

"After  the  war  ended."  relates  Lamon.  "a  I'nited  States- 
Senator  called  on  President  Lincoln  to  give  his  idea  as  to 
how  the  conquered  South  should  be  treated.     As  Mr.  Lin- 


Chai\  7  Facts  and  Fai-skhoods.  31 

coin  (lid  not  readily  accept  the  sii.^-o-estions.  the  Senator  burst 
out  an^rilw  'Mr.  President,  it  does  appear  to  some  of  your 
friends.  ni\self  included,  as  if  you  had  taken  leave  of  your 
senses.'  The  Senator  strode  ott  in  a  rag-e  ;  meeting  on  the 
avenue  a  Congressman,  his  wrath  exploded  in  words: 
'Lincoln  is  a  damned  idiot!'  he  blurted  out.  'He  has  no 
spirit.  He's  as  weak  as  an  old  woman.  He  never  was 
fitted  for  the  position  he  holds.'  " 

"He  is  not  fitted  for  the  office  he  holds,"  had  been  the  cry 
of  nearly  every  Republican  of  distinction  from  the  first  day  Lin- 
coln was  seen  in  Washington,  and  that  cry  was  kept  up  to 
the  last  day  of  his  life.  The  apotheosis  ceremony  served  no- 
tice on  the  whole  Republican  party  tliat  that  cry  must  be  forever 
silenced,  that  from  that  hour  Lincoln  must  be  viewed  as  a  de- 
ified man,  as  one  having  entered  the  "sublime  realm  of  the 
gods." 

Lamon  has  another  story  showing  how  little  Lincoln's  con- 
temporaries esteemed  or  respected  him  : 

"A  short  time,"  relates  Mr.  Lamon.  "before  the  fall  of 
Vicksburg,  Mr.  Lincoln  said  to  me,  'I  feel  I  have  made  Sen- 
ator Wade  my  enemy  for  life.'  'How?"  T  asked. 
'Wade,'  he  replied,  'was  here  urging  me  to  dismiss  Grant. 
I  said,  'Senator,  that  reminds  me  of  a  story.'  'Yes!  Yes!' 
he  petulantly  interrupted,  'with  you,  sir,  it  is  all  story,  story. 
storv!  You  are  the  father  of  every  military  blunder  since 
the  war  begun !  You  are  on  your  way  to  hell,  sir !  and 
with  this  Government.  You  are  not  half  a  mile  off  this 
minute!'  Wade  was  very  angry;  grabbing  up  his  hat  and 
,  cane  he  went  off." 

"Certain  it  is."  comments  Lamon,  "had  not  Vicks- 
burg been  speedily  captured,  Lincoln  would  have  been  de- 
posed." 

Lamon  speaks  of  the  "aggressive  spirit  of  Congress  toward 
President  Lincoln,"  and  of  the  "small  respect  and  less  love  Con- 
gressmen and  Senators  bore  to  the  living  Lincoln." 

Senator  Hale,  one  of  the  foremost  Republican  leaders, 
from  the  Senate  floor  assailed  Lincoln. 

"Senators,"  said  Hale,  "we  must  not  strike  too  high  or 
too  low,  but  between  wind  and  weather.  The  Marshal  is 
the  man  to  hit." 

Marshal  Lamon  being  Lincoln's  closest  personal  friend, 
Hale  proposed  to  strike  the  iVesident  over  Lamon's  shoulders. 


32 


Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap. 


Lincoln  himself  told  LanvDn  that  Hale  was  hitting  at  h.iio. 

"This    opijosition    to    Lincoln,"    says    Lamon,    "became 
more  and   more   offensive.     The   leaders   resorted  to   every 
means    in    their    power    to    thwart    him.     This    opposition 
lasted  to  the  end  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  life." 

These  men  habitually  referred  to  the  Chief  Magistrate  of 
the  Republic  as  "that  hideous  baboon  at  the  other  end  of  the 
avenue." 

McClure's  Life  of  Lincoln  shows  the  hostile  attitude  toward 
Lincoln  of  the  leading  members  of  the  Cabinet,  and  adds : 

"Outside  of  the  Cabinet,  the  leaders  were  quite  as  dis- 
trustful of  President  Lincoln's  ability  to  fill  the  great  office 
he  held.  Senators  Trumbull,  Wade,  Chandler,  Winter 
Davis,  and  the  men  of  the  new  political  power  did  not 
conceal  their  distrust  of  Lincoln.  Lincoln  had  little  support 
from  them  at  any  time  during  his  administration." 

The  reader  should  bear  in  mind  the  fact  that  it  is  the  unan- 
imous testimony  of  Republican  writers  that  two-thirds 
of  the  people  of  the  Northern  States,  from  the  very  begin- 
ning of  his  administration,  opposed  Lincoln's  war  on  the  South, 
and  continued  openly  to  oppose  until  the  strong  machinery  of 
the  Lincoln  Government  suppressed  free  speech  and  strangled 
the  once  free  press.  In  the  face  of  this  fact  the  reader  will  no- 
tice that  McClure,  as  other  RepubUcan  writers  of  today,  glibly 
and  presumptuously  call  the  small  minority  of  Republicans  who 
supported  Lincoln's  and  Seward's  war  measures  "the  Nation." 
McClure,  Morse  and  other  writers  tell  their  readers  that  two- 
thirds  of  the  people  opposed  Lincoln,  yet  in  the  next  breath  tell 
them,  "The  men  (Republican  war  men)  to  whom  the  Nation 
turned,"  etc.  This  is  on  its  face  false.  The  word  Nation 
implies  the  great  body  of  the  people.  The  two-thirds  of  the 
people  have  more  right  to  be  called  "the  Nation"  than  the  one- 
third.  As  two-thirds  of  the  people  made  the  Nation,  and  these 
two-thirds  strongly  opposed  the  war  measures  which  Trumbull, 
Wade,  Chandler  and  others  who  -•  •>  .vaging  the  cruel  and 
bloody  war  which  they,  the  two-thiiJ:,,  they  the  Nation,  bitterly 
opposed,  it  follows  that  they,  the  two-thn-ds,  "the  Nation,"  could 
not  and  did  not  turn  to  those  war  Republicans  for  any  purpose 
whatever  except  to  condemn  and  deplore  their  evil  work  of 
blood.  The  custom  of  ignoring  the  great  body  of  the  people  as 
if  they  had  no  existence  is  common  in  kingly  countries,  but 


Chap.  7  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  33 

was  not  ill  vogue  in  this  Republic  until  shortly  after  Seward 
and  Lincoln  changed  a  free  Republic  into  an  imperial  govern- 
ment. Observing  Americans  in  England  may  have  noticed  this 
custom  as  seen  in  the  London  papers.  When  Parliament  ad- 
journs and  royalty  and  the  high  fashionable  few  leave  the"  city, 
as  they  always  do  when  the  society  season  is  over,  the  London 
newspapers  calmly  announce  that  "London  is  empty."  And  one 
high  society  man  will  say  to  another,  "There  isn't  a  soul  in  the 
city."  One  may  often  see  this  expression  in  English  novels 
coming  from  the  mouth  of  some  high  society  man  or  woman. 
Some  Republican  papers  of  America  are  so  imbued  with  the  im- 
perial spirit  they  also  use  the  insulting  phrase.  The  Globe- 
Democrat,  a  Republican  paper  of  St.  Louis,  in  big  head  lines 
over  an  article  concerning  the  recent  crowning  of  the  English 
King,  made  the  following  announcement: 

"EXODUS  FROM  LONDON." 

"The  City  Practically  Deserted  Since  the  Coronation." 

"Practically  deserted,"  when  four  or  five  million  souls 
were  still  in  the  city.  These  unconscious  insults  to  the  mil- 
lion working  people  in  London  come  from  the  worship  of  royal- 
ty and  the  nobility.  Li  America  it  comes  from  the  worship  of 
wealth  and  men  in  high  office.  In  both  cases  the  basic  cause 
is  the  prevalence  of  monarchic  principles. 

The  Rev.  R.  Fuller,  a  Baptist  minister  from  Baltimore, 
who  was  spokesman  for  the  young  Christians,  wrote  Chase 
from  Baltimore  April  23,  1861,  of  his  interview  with  Presi- 
dent Lincoln,  as  follows: 

"From  Mr.  Lincoln  nothing  is  to  be  expected  except 
as  you  can  influence  him.  Five  associations,  representing 
thousands  of  our  best  young  men,  sent  a  delegation  of  thirty  to 
Washington  yesterday  and  asked  me  to  go  along  as  chairman. 
We  were  cordially  received.  I  marked  the  President  closely; 
he  is  constitutionally  gay  and  jovial,  but  he  is  wholly  inacces- 
sible to  Christian  appeals.  His  egotism  will  forever  prevent  his 
comprehending  what  patriotism  means." 

(See  Rhode's  History  of  U.  S.  and  Chase's  M.  S.  Papers.) 

Rhodes  states  that  Lincoln  clearly  said  to  the  young  Chris- 
tian delegates : 

"I  have  no  desire  to  invade  the  South,  but  I  must  have 
troops  to  defend  this  capital." 

This  was  pure  trickery  on  Lincoln's  part.     In  the  second 


34  Facts  and  Falskhoods.  Chav.       8 

part  of  tliis  work  will  l)e  found  indisputable  evidence  to  prove 
the  fact  that  before  Lincohi  entered  on  the  Presidency,  certainly 
during  the  first  month  of  his  incuml)ency,  he  and  Seward 
determined  on  war.  and  determined  to  make  the  Xorthern  peo])k' 
believe  the  South  began  it.  Lincoln  well  knew  his  capital  was 
in  no  particle  of  danger  until  after  he  himself  began  the  war. 


Chapter  J' If  I. 

Henidon's  Pen  Portrait  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  A  Springfield 
Laz\.'ye/s  Pen  Portrait.  General  Piatt  on  "Pious  Lies."  The 
"Real  Lincoln  Disappeared  from  Human  Knowledge.'"' 
Herndon's  Life  of  L'ncoln.  Why  Suppresed.  Extracts 
From  the  Suppressed  Work. 

It  is  known  that  the  outside  form  of  man  or  beast,  the  shape 
of  his  head,  his  body,  the  expression  of  his  eyes,  the  tone  of  his 
voice,  are  indices  of  his  mental  and  moral  character.  Few  may 
be  able  to  interpret  these  indices,  nevertheless  they  are  signs 
stamped  by  the  Creator  himself.  For  this  reason  I  shall  lay  be- 
fore my  readers  two  pen  portraits  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  drawn  by  two 
men  who  knew  him  in  Springfield — both  drawn  soon  after  Mr. 
Lincoln's  death,  and  before  his  burial,  as  he  lay  in  his  costly  cata- 
falque. Both  of  these  portraits  are  taken  from  Herndon's  sup- 
pressed Life  of  Lincoln ;  both  are  reproduced  in  Mr.  Weik's  "True 
Story  of  a  Great  Life,"  purporting  to  have  been  written  by  Hern- 
don. 

Herndon's  pen  portrait  of  ^Ir.  Lincoln: 

"Abraham  Lincoln  was  six  feet  four  inches  high.  He 
was  thin  in  the  chest,  wiry,  sinewy,  raw-boned,  and  narrow 
across  the  shoulders.  His  legs  were  unnaturally  long  and 
out  of  proportion  to  his  body.  His  forehead  was  high  and 
narrow,  his  jaws  long,  his  nose  long,  large  and  blunt  at  the 
tip,  ruddy  and  turned  awry  toward  the  right.  A  few  hairs 
here  and  there  sprouted,  on  his  face.  His  chin  projected  far 
and  sharp  and  turned  up  to  meet  a  thick,  material,  down- 
hanging  lip.  His  cheeks  w^ere  flabby,  the  loose  skin  in  folds 
or  wrinkles.  His  hair  was  brown,  stiff  and  unkempt.  His 
complexion  very  dark,  his  skin  yellow,  shriveled  and  leatherv. 
His  whole  aspect  was  cadaverous  and  woe-struck.  His  ears 
were  large  and  stood  out  at  almost  right  angles  from  his 
head.     He  had  no  dignity  of  manner,  and  was  extremely  un- 


Chap.  8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  35 

gainly  and  awkward.  TTis  voice  was  shrill  and  pipincf.  He 
usually  wore  an  old  hat  and  a  faded  hrown  coat  which  hung 
baggy  on  his  long,  gaunt  frame.  His  breeches  were  usu- 
ally six  inches  too  short,  showing  his  big,  bony  shins;  his 
sleeves  were  six  inches  too  short,  showing  his  big,  bonv 
hands.  His  body  was  shrunk  and  shriveled.  He  usually 
slept  in  a  long,  coarse,  yellow  flannel  night-gown,  which 
struck  him  just  below  his  knobby  knees,  showing  his  long, 
lanky  legs  and  big  feet.  (A  young  lawyer  first  seeing  him 
in  this  costume  was  almost  paralyzed.)  The  first  impres- 
sion of  a  stranger  on  seeing  Mr.  Lincoln  walk,  was  that  he 
was  a  tricky  man  :  his  walk  implied  shrewdness." 

If  tlie  reader  wishes  to  study  the  strange  character  of  Mr. 
Lincoln,  he  must  bear  in  mind  the  above  description  of  his  per- 
son. When  we  present  the  salient  features  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  men- 
tal and  moral  nature,  the  analytical  reader  can  compare  them  with 
his  physical,  especially  should  the  reader  hold  in  memory  these 
words :  "The  first  impression  of  a  stranger  on  seeing  Mr.  Lincoln 
walk  zvas  that  lie  z<.'as  a  tricky  man." 

If  there  ever  was  a  tricky  man  born  on  earth,  it  was  Abraham 
Lincoln.  Side  by  side  of  his  own  pen  portrait  of  Lincoln.  Hern- 
don  places  another,  drawn  by  a  Springfield  lawyer,  who  did  not 
wish  his  name  given  : 

"I  am  particularly  requested."  said  this  lawyer,  "to  write 
out  my  opinion  of  the  man,  Abraham  Lincoln,  late  President 
of  the  I'nited  States.  T  consent  to  do  this  without  any  other 
motive  than  to  comply  with  the  request  of  a  brother  lawyer. 
While  Mr.  Lincoln  and  I  were  good  friends,  I  believe  myself 
wholly  indififcrent  to  the  future  of  his  memory.  I\Iy  opinion 
of  him  was  formed  by  a  personal  and  professional  acquaint- 
ance of  over  ten  years,  and  has  not  been  altered  or  influenced 
by  any  of  his  promotions  in  public  life.  The  adulation  by 
base  multitudes  of  a  living  and  the  pageantry  surrounding  a 
(lead  President  do  not  shake  my  well-settled  convictions  of  the 
man's  mental  calibre.  Phrenologically  and  physiologically, 
the  man  was  a  sort  of  monstrosity.  His  frame  was  large, 
bony  and  muscular.  His  head  was  small  and  disproportion- 
ately shaped.  He  had  large,  square  jaws,  a  large,  heavy 
nose,  a  small,  lascivious  mouth,  soft,  tender,  bluish  eyes.  T 
would  say  he  was  a  cross  between  a  A^enus  and  a  Hercules. 
I  believe  it  to  be  inconsistent  with  the  law  of  huirian  organiza- 
tion for  any  such  creature  to  possess  a  mind  capable  of  any- 


36        "'  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.      8 

thin^  ^reat.  The  man's  mind  partook  of  the  incongruities 
of  his  hodv.  Tt  was  the  pecuHarities  of  his  mental  and  the 
odditv  of  his  physical  structure,  as  well  as  his  head,  that 
singled  him  out  from  the  mass  of  men." 

Lamon  says  of  Herndon  : 

"He  was  a  lifelong  abolitionist,  devoted  to  public  phi- 
lanthropy and  disinterested  political  labors.  Herndon  was  a 
fierce  zealot  and  gloried  in  being  called  fanatic.  He  said 
fanaticism  at  all  times  was  the  salt  of  the  earth,  with  the  pow- 
er to  save  it.  He  was  hot-blooded  morally  and  physically.  He 
had  determined  to  make  an  abolitionist  out  of  Lincoln  when 
the  proper  time  came,  and  he  knew  that  time  would  only 
be  when  Lincoln  could  change  front  and  come  out  without 
detriment  to  his  personal  aspirations." 

Herndon's  work  of  converting  Mr.  Lincoln  to  the  abolition 
cause  was  slow.  Lincoln  had  not  in  him  one  particle  of  the  stuff 
martyrs  are  made  of.  Abolition  at  that  time  was  unpopular  in 
Illinois.  Lincoln  was  afraid  to  take  it  up  and  did  not  commit 
himself  to  it  until  1858,  two  years  before  his  nomination  for  the 
Presidency. 

General  Don  Piatt,  an  officer  in  the  Union  Army,  a  man  of 
some  culture  and  literary  attainment,  who  knew  Mr.  Lincoln 
personally  and  greatly  admired  him,  made  a  study  of  his  charac- 
ter. In  "Men  Who  Saved  the  Union,"  Piatt  expresses  the  belief 
that  God  especially  called  Lincoln  to  office  to  do  the  work  he  did. 
Piatt,  as  well  as  Herndon  and  Lamon,  did  not  approve  of  apoth- 
eosizing Mr.  Lincoln.  These  three  men  were  anxious  to  have 
the  real  Lincoln  known  to  the  world. 

On  this  subject  Piatt  wrote  thus : 

"With  us  when  a  leader  dies,  all  good  men  (meaning 
stanch  Republicans)  go  to  lying  about  him.  From  the 
monument  tJiat  covers  his  remains  to  the  last  echo  of  the 
rural  press,  in  speeches,  in  sermons,  eulogies,  reminiscences, 
we  hear  nothing  but  pious  lies." 

Piatt  refers  to  the  lies  told  about  Lincoln,  but  he  makes  the 
mistake  of  calling  those  lies  "pious."  That  word  is  usually  ap- 
plied to  praise  bestowed  on  the  dead  to  please  living  friends  and 
relations.  The  lies  told  about  Lincoln  were  told  wholly  and  solely 
for  political  effect,  for  the  purpose  of  supporting  the  Republican 
party.  Neither  Herndon,  Lamon  or  Piatt  seemed  to  understand 
this.     They  wanted  the  truth  to  be  known,  but  they  did  not  se^m 


Chap.  8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  37 

to  perceive  that  the  truth  about  Lincoln  would  injure  the  party, 
would  belittle  and  disgrace  it,  would  put  a  thousand  clubs  into  the 
hands  of  Democrats  to  beat  the  part}-  down  and  out  of  oflfice.  Pol- 
iticians saw  this,  and  determined  that  the  real  Lincoln  should 
never  be  known. 

"Abraham  Lincoln,"  continued  General  Piatt.,  "has  al- 
most disappeared  from  human  knowledge.     I  hear  of  him,  I 
.  read  of  him  in  eulogies  and  biographies,  but  I  fail  to  recog- 
nize the  man  I  knew  in  life." 

Herndon  and  Lamon  also  failed  to  recognize  in  the  eulogies 
and  biographies  the  man  they  knew  in  life.  The  thing  they  saw 
was  not  the  portrait  of  the  real  Lincoln.  It  was  the  effigy  which 
Republican  leaders  had  hastily  manufactured,  after  their  apoth- 
eosis ceremony,  and  had  started  down  the  ages  labeled  "Abraham 
Lincoln,  the  first  President  of  the  Republican  party,  the  great- 
est, wisest,  purest  man  who  ever  trod  the  earth  since  Jesus  of 
Nazareth."  No  man  who  will  look  at  the  facts  of  history  can 
doubt  the  truth  of  this. 

At  the  time  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  death,  1865,  his  close  and  loving 
friend,  Lamon,  determined  to  write  his  life. 

"But,"  says  Lamon,  "I  soon  learned  that  Mr.  William  H. 
Herndon  was  similarly  engaged.  There  could  be  no  rivalry 
between  us.  The  supreme  object  of  both  was  to  make  the 
real  history  and  character  of  Mr.  Lincoln  as  well  known  to 
the  public  as  they  were  to  us.  Mr.  Herndon,  as  I,  deplr>red 
the  many  publications  pretending  to  be  biographies  of  Lin- 
coln, which  teemed  from  the  press  so  long  as  there  was  hope 
of  gain.  Out  of  the  mass  of  these  works,  of  only  07ie  is  it 
possible  to  speak  with  any  degree  of  respect." 

And  that  one  (Holland's)  falsified  and  whitewashed. 

For  the  above  reason  Lamon  gave  up  his  intention  of  writing 
Lincoln's  biography,  leaving  the  task  to  Herndon.  Herndon's 
Life  of  Lincoln  was  published  soon  after  Lincoln's  death.  Its 
reception  by  Republicans  was  peculiar.  Not  a  man  at  that  time, 
so  far  as  I  can  discover,  denied  or  expressed  a  doubt  of  its  hon- 
esty, its  friendliness  to  Lincoln  or  of  its  veracity.  Certain  Re- 
publican journals  wondered  why  Herndon  thought  it  necessary 
to  tell  this  and  that  concerning  his  friend's  life.  One  or  two 
made  favorable  comments.  The  Glohe-Democrat,  of  St.  Louis, 
as  late  as  1897,  ^^^  this: 

"Herndon's  Biography  of  Lincoln  is,  in  many  respects. 


38  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       8 

the  best  that  has  yet  been  written.  There  is  no  doubt  that  his 
account  is  wholly  trustworthy,  and  there  is  nothing  more  in 
teresting  in  all  the  output  of  Lincoln  literature." 

The  editor  of  the  Globc-Dciiwcraf  was  an  officer  in  the 
Union  Army. 

In  another  issue  of  the  GIohc-Dcinocrat  we  find  this: 

"There  is  no  doubt  that  Herndon's  account  of  Lincoln  is 
entirely  trustworthy.  Herndon  and  Lincoln  were  practically 
in  daily  contact  for  over  twenty  years  and  their  relations 
were  entirely  amicable.  Life  went  hard  with  Herndon  in  late 
years  (after  Lincoln's  death)  ;  he  fell  heir  to  a  farm  near 
Springfield,  dropped  the  law  and  went  into  fancy  stock-rais- 
ing, which  soon  resulted  disastrously.  Then  he  took  to  hard 
drinking  and  not  long  afterward  died  in  poverty.  He  was 
Lincoln's  law  partner  and  closest  friend  for  over  sixteen 
years.  His  biography  of  Lincoln,  in  many  respects,  is  the 
best  one  that  ever  has  been  written." 

Hapgood,  in  1899.  wrote  an  apotheosizing  work  called 
"Abraham  Lincoln."     Hapgood  says  : 

"Herndon  has  told  President  Lincoln's  life  with  the  most 
refreshing  honestv  and  with  more  information  than  anv  one 
else." 

Such  being  the  character  of  Herndon's  Life  of  Lincoln,  the 
reader  may  be  surprised  to  learn  that  this  work  is  not  now  to  be 
had  for  love  or  money.  Why  ?'  For  the  one  and  sole  reason 
that  it  did  not  coincide  with  the  apotheosis  ceremony.  It  did 
not  portray  the  character  of  Abraham  Lincoln  as  the  Republican 
leaders  wished  it  to  be  portrayed.  It  pictured  the  real  Lincoln, 
not  the  effigy  which  had  been  hurriedl}'  gotten  up  by  the  apoth- 
eosizers.  For  these  reasons,  certain  Republicans  resolved  to 
spirit  out  of  existence  every  copy  they  could  get.  Agents  were 
sent  on  a  still  hunt  and  every  book  they  could  find  was  destroyed  ; 
even  the  publisher's  plates  were  obtained  and  broken  to  pieces. 
A  near  relative  of  Herndon,  in  a  position  to  know,  is  responsible 
for  this  statement.  This  relative  further  states  the  reason  was 
that  "Mr.  Herndon  had  told  too  many  truths  about  Lincoln." 
Truth  did  not  harmonize  with  the  apotheosis  ceremony.  When, 
in  1869,  Lamon  realized  that  his  friend  Herndon's  work  was  pass- 
ing out  of  existence,  driven  out  by  Republican  politicians,  he 
returned  to  his  intention  of  writing  Lincoln's  life.  Lamon  and 
Herndon  well  understood  that  Republican  politicians  did  not  want 


Chap.  8  Facts  and  FAi-SKiioons.  ]<.) 

the  real  Lincoln  shown  to  the  world,  but  did  not  seem  to  know 
that  those  politicians  looked  upon  it  as  a  vital  necessity  to  the 
prosperity  of  their  party  to  present  .Mr.  Lincoln  to  the  world,  not 
as  he  was  in  life,  not  as  they  had  known  hint,  but  as  a  deified  be- 
ing of  unparalleled  greatness,  wisdom  and  virtue.     Being  either 
ignorant  or  indifferent  on  this  matter.  Lamon  was  as  anxious  as 
Herndon  had  been  to  show  the  public  his  hero  and  friend,  exactly 
as  he  and  his  contemporaries  in  Illinois  had  known  him.     The 
"venomous  detractions"  of  politicians   in   Washington   City  had 
not  in  the  least  shaken  Lamon's  and  Herndon 's  love  for  Lincoln. 
They  scouted  and  despised  the  deification  twaddle  which  these 
detractors  put  in  play,  even  before  the  real  Lincoln  was  cold  in 
his  coffin.     In  this  spirit  Lamon  set  to  work,  1869,  to  write  the 
true  story  of  Lincoln  to  take  the  place  of  the  suppressed  w^ork 
of  Herndon.     Poor  Herndon  was  bitterly  disappointed  at  the  un- 
merited fate  of  his  book.     He  had  spent  a  deal  of  money,  time 
and  labor  in  gathering  materials — "rich  materials" — had  traveled 
far   and   wide   seeking  and   interviewing   the   early    friends   and 
relatives  of  Lincoln.     He  had  hoped  not  only  to  make  money  by 
his  labor  of  love,  but  to  win  fame  as  the  writer  of  the  best  biog- 
raphy of  the  greatest  man  extant.     Lamon  paid  Herndon  $3,000 
for  the  privilege  of  using  his  "rich  materials."     In  1872  Lamon's 
Life  of  Lincoln  was  published.     It  certainly  is  the  best  yet  writ- 
ten, except  Herndon's,  but  if  my  information  is  correct,  the  same 
influences  which  swept  Herndon's  book  out  of  existence    are  at 
worjc   secretly  to  destroy   Lamon's.     At  this  writing,   February 
12,  1903,  it  is  hardly  possible  to  obtain  even  a  second-hand  copy 
of  Lamon.     Herndon's  work  was  the  better,  inasmuch  as  it  was 
terser  and  made  no  effort  to  whitewash  a  single  act  of  its  hero. 
Lamon  had  lived  more  in  the  world  than  Herndon,  and  felt  the 
necessitv  of  trimming  and  softening  somewhat  to  suit  polite  so- 
cietv.     jMeanwhile,  as  Lamon  put  it,  the  press  continued  to  teem 
with  "pretended  lives  of  Lincoln,  not  one  of  which  deserved  one 
particle  of  respect."     These  pretended  biographies  are   fostered 
and  praised  and  cherished  by  Republicans.     The  falser  they  are, 
the  higher  the  praise.     A  short  time  ago  a  Republican  paper  stat- 
ed that  800  different  lives  of  Lincoln  had  been  published. 

As  time  passed  inquiries  were  made  for  Herndon's  work.  To 
allay  curiosity  as  w^ell  as  to  impose  another  life  on  the  public,  in 
1889,  twenty-four  years  after  Lincoln's  death,  a  three  volume 
book  was  published  by  Bedford,  Clark  &  Company,  in  Chicago,  en- 
titled : 


40  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.       8 

THE  TRUE  STORY  OF  A  GREAT  LIFE. 
THE  HISTORY  OF  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 

BY 

WILLIAM  H.  HERNDON, 
For  Tzventy  Years  His  Friend  and  Laiv  Partner, 

AND 

JESSE  WILLIAM  WEIK,  A.  M. 

If  anyone  who  has  ever  read  Mr.  Herndon's  suppressed  Life  of 
Lincoln  will  compare  it  with  this  three-volume  affair,  he  will  know 
that  this  last  was  not  written  by  Herndon.  The  preface,  without 
doubt,  is  Herndon's.  The  body  of  the  work  shows  that  Mr.  Weik 
(as  Lamon)  had  access  to  Herndon's  "rich  materials."  But  the 
object  of  the  three  men,  Herndon,  Lamon  and  Weik,  was  not  the 
same.  The  two  first  really  aimed  to  paint  Lincoln  as  he  was.  Mr. 
Weik  wished  to  please  the  Republican  party.  Herndon's  preface 
shows  that  the  purpose  which  dominated  him  in  1866,  when  he 
wrote  the  first  life  of  Lincoln,  was  unshaken.  He  still,  1889,  be- 
lieved the  truth,  all  the  truth,  about  Lincoln  should  be  told,  and 
although  his  first  book  had  been  driven  out  of  existence  because 
it  told  the  truth  twenty-four  years  later,  Herndon  still  wanted  the 
truth  told,  and  had  a  hope  the  truth  would  be  told,  and  might 
live  and  put  to  flight  the  mass  of  lies  that  flooded  the  country.  At 
this  time,  twenty-four  years  after  Lincoln's  death,  misfortune 
had  overtaken  Herndon.  Disappointment,  poverty,  drink,  had 
broken  down  the  stern  old  fanatic  who  had  labored  so  many  years 
to  convert  Lincoln  to  the  abolition  cause.  Weik's  intention,  it 
seems,  was  to  concoct  a  book  which  would  just  give  enough  truth 
to  interest,  and  not  enough  to  oflfend  the  Republican  apotheo- 
sizers.  In  his  preface  to  Mr.  Weik's  three  volumes,  Herndon 
makes  the  following  statement: 

"Over  twenty  years  ago  I  begun  tliis  book,  but  an  active 
life  at  the  bar  caused  its  postponement.  Being  now  advanced 
in  years,  I  feel  unable  to  carry  out  the  undertaking,  and  am 
assisted  by  Mr.  Weik." 

Being  advanced  in  years,  weakened  by  drink  and  misfortunes, 
it  can  be  easily  beheved  that  Mr.  J.  W.  Weik  financially  remu- 
nerated Mr.  Herndon  for  concealing  the  fact  that  not  only  had 
he  (Herndon)  begun  to  write  Lincoln's  life  over  twenty  years 


Chap.  8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  41 

previous,  but  had  written  and  published  it,  and  had  witnessed  its 
destruction  by  those  he  had  imagined  would  set  a  high  value  on  it. 
Weik,  no  doubt,  fancied  his  book  would  sell  better  if  it  were 
thought  to  be  the  only  life  of  Lincoln  Herndon  had  written.  In 
the  preface  to  this  Weik  book,  Herndon  makes  the  following  -state- 
ment of  intentions  which  are  not  fulfilled  in  the  book  itself: 

"With  a  view,"  says  Herndon,  "to  throwing  hght  on 
some  attributes  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  character  heretofore  obscure, 
these  volumes  are  given  to  the  world.  The  whole  truth  con- 
cerning Mr,  Lincoln  should  be  known.  The  truth  will  at 
last  come  out,  and  no  man  need  hope  to  evade  it.  Some 
persons  will  doubtless  object  to  the  narrative  of  certain  facts 
which  they  contend  should  be  assigned  to  the  tomb.  Their 
pretense  is  that  no  good  can  come  from  such  ghastly  expos- 
ures. My  answer  is,  that  these  facts  are  indispensable  to  a 
full  knowledge  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  We  must  have  all  the  facts 
concerning  him.  We  must  he  prepared  to  take  Mr.  Lin- 
coln as  he  was.  He  rose  from  a  lower  depth  than  any  other 
great  man  did — from  a  stagnant,  putrid  pool.  I  should  be 
remiss  in  my  duty  if  I  did  not  throw  light  on  this  part  of 
the  picture.  Mr.  Lincoln  was  my  warm,  devoted  friend.  I 
always  loved  him.  I  revere  his  name  to  this  day.  My  pur- 
pose to  tell  the  truth  about  him  need  occasion  no  apprehen- 
sion. God's  naked  truth  cannot  injure  his  fame.  The  world 
should  be  told  what  the  skeleton  zvas  with  Lincoln,  what  can- 
cer he  had  inside." 

Thus  wrote  the  honest  old  fanatic ;  though  broken  in  health, 
though  reduced  to  poverty,  he  was  the  same  man  who  loved 
truth  and  only  truth.  But  the  promises  made  by  Herndon  in  the 
above  preface  are  not  kept  in  the  body  of  the  so-called  "Herndon 
and  Weik's  Story  of  Lincoln."  No  ghastly  exposures  are  made. 
The  "cancer  inside"  is  not  spoken  of.  The  "lower  depths,  thr 
stagnant,  putrid  pool,"  are  not  mentioned.  On  the  contrary,  the 
larger  part  of  this  three-volume  work  plainly  bears  the  apoth- 
eosis stamp,  but  it  tells  some  things  of  Lincoln's  early  life  which 
Republicans  wish  to  bury  out  of  sight.  Consequently,  even  this 
so-called  "True  Story  of  Lincoln"  is  under  the  ban,  and  almost 
out  of  existence.  I  am  told  that  Appleton  has  just  brought  out 
these  three  volumes  in  one,  and  that  certain  facts  incompatible 
with  the  apotheosis  plan  are  left  entirely  out.  I  am  not  anxious 
to  show  my  readers  "stagnant,  putrid  pools,"  or  "ghastly  expos- 
ures" or  "inside  cancers"  which  have  no  direct  bearing  on  Mr, 


42  Facts  and  IvM.sninooDS.  Chap.       8 

Lincoln'?  jiiblic  acts,  but  the  character,  the  deeds,  showing  the 
moral  qualities  of  the  man  our  boys  are  urged  to  emulate  and 
revere,  are  matters  of  vital  concern  to  all  Christian  parents,  i^^jr 
this  reason  I  shall  reproduce  from  Herndon's  suppressed  Life 
of  Lincoln  extracts  showing  what  manner  of  man  was  the  real 
Lincoln. 

Extracts  from  Herndon's  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln  found 
scattered  over  the  pages  of  that  work,  which  was  brought  out  soon 
after  Lincoln's  death : 

1.  "Mr.  Lincoln  possessed  inordinate  desire  to  rise 
in  the  world  :  to  hold  high  positions  in  high  offices." 

2.  "Mr.  Lincoln  always  craved  office." 

3.  "Mr.  Lincoln  coveted  honor  and  was  eager  for  pow- 
er. He  was  impatient  of  any  interference  that  delayed  or 
obstructed  his  progress." 

4.  "Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  shrewd  and  by  no  means  an  un- 
selfish politician.  When  battling  for  a  principle,  it  was  after 
a  discreet  fashion.  When  he  was  running  for  the  Legislature 
his  speeches  were  calculated  to  make  fair  weather  with  all 
sides.  W^hen  running  for  the  United  States  Senate,  he  was 
willing  to  make  a  sacrifice  of  opinion  to  further  his  own  aspi- 
rations." 

5.  "When  Lovejo}-,  the  zealous  abolitionist,  came  to 
Springfield  to  speak  against  slavery,  Lincoln  left  town  to 
avoid  taking  sides  either  for  or  against  abolition.  This 
course  practically  saved  Lincoln,  as  the  people  did  not  know 
whetlier  he  was  an  abolitionist  or  not." 

6.  "Lincoln  believed  in  protective  tariff^,  yet  when  urged 
to  write  a  letter  for  the  public  saying  so,  he  refused,  on  the 
ground  that  it  would  do  him  no  good." 

7.  "Until  Mr.  Lincoln's  'house  divided  against  itself 
speech,  in  1858,  he  was  very  cautious  in  his  anti-slavery 
expressions.  Even  after  the  Bloomington  convention  he 
continued  to  pick  his  way  to  the  front  with  wary  steps.  He 
did  not  take  his  stand  with  the  boldest  agitators  until  just 
in  time  to  take  Seward's  place  on  the  Presidential  ticket  ftf 
i860." 

8.  "To  be  popular  was  to  Lincoln  the  greatest  good 
in  life."  Yet  Republicans  call  him  'The  Martyr  President.' 
Do  martyrs  crave  popularitx? 

9.  "Lincoln  made  simplicity  and  candor  a  mask  to  hide 
his  true  self." 


Chap.  9  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  43 

10.  "Lincoln  was  extremely  fond  of  discussing  politics. 
He  disliked  work.  TTe  detested  science  and  literature.  No 
man  can  put  his  fin,q;-er  on  any  book  written  in  the  last  or 
present  century  (Nineteenth)  that  Lincoln  read  through.  He 
read  but  little." 

11.  "If  ever."  said  Lincoln,  "the  American  soci- 
ety of  the  United  States  arc  demoralized  and  overthrown,  it 
will  come  from  the  voracious  desire  for  office,  the  wriggle 
to  live  W'ithout  work,  toil  or  lal)or.  from  which  I  am  not  free 
myself." 

12.  "Lincoln  had  no  gratitude.  He  forgot  the  devotion 
of  his  warmest  friends  and  partisans  as  soon  as  the  occasion 
of  their  service  had  passed.'" 

13.  "Lincoln   seldom  ])raised  anyone;  never  a   rival." 

14.  "Lincoln  never  permitted  himself  to  be  influenced 
by  the  claims  of  individual  men.  When  he  was  a  candidate 
himself  he  thought  the  whole  canvass  ought  to  be  conducted 
with  reference  to  his  success.  He  would  .say  to  a  man.  'Your 
continuance  in  the  field  injures  inc.'  and  be  quite  sure  he 
had  given  a  perfect  reason  for  the  man's  withdrawal.  He 
would  have  no  obstacle  in  his  way. 

15.  "Lincoln  was  intensely  cautious.  He  revealed  just 
enough  of  his  plans  to  allure  support  and  not  enough  to  ex- 
pose him  to  personal  opposition." 

16.  "When  first  a  candidate  for  the  L^nited  States  Senate 
Lincoln  was  willing  to  sacrifice  his  own  opinion  to  further 
hi»  aspirations   for  the   Presidency." 

17.  "Notwithstanding  Lincoln's  over- weening  ambi- 
tion, and  the  breathless  eagerness  wnth  which  he  pursued 
the  object  of  it.  he  had  not  a  particle  of  sympathy  with  any 
of  his  fellow-citizens  who  were  engaged  in  a  similar  scram- 
ble for  place  and  power." 

CHAPTER  IX. 

LincoJyi's  Jealousy.  Lincoln's  Passion  for  Cock-Hg^hts  and  Fist 
Fii:;hfs.  Holland's  Comment  Thereon.  Lincoln  the  "Soul 
of  Honesty."  He  Passes  off  Counterfeit  Money.  Lincoln 
Sewed  up  Hoi:^s'  Eyes.  The  "Old  Hu.::cy"  Kicks  Lincoln 
Senseless.  A  Great  Fight.  "I  Am  the  Big  Buck  of  the 
Lick."  ^      . 

Lamon  gives  the  same  account  of  Lincoln's  political  char- 
acter.    Lamon  speaks  of  Lincoln's  "burning  ambition   for  dis- 


44  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.      9 

tinction,"  which  never  abated,  never  ceased  till  life  ceased.  Yet 
neither  Herndon  or  Lamon  even  hint  that  any  higher,  less  selfish 
motive  than  desire  to  lift  himself  in  the  world  inspired  Lincoln's 
struggle  for  office.  We  are  not  told  that  Lincoln  had  plans  or 
dreamed  dreams  that  if  he  attained  high  place  he  would  use  it 
for  the  benefit  of  unfortunate  humanity,  of  the  downtrodden. 
Since  Lincoln's  death  his  apotheosizers  attribute  high  motives 
to  him,  but  there  is  no  proof.  Those  who  best  knew  him  saw  no 
such  motives,  and,  in  fact,  themselves  did  not  seem  to  know  such 
motives  were  desirable  or  expected.  Modern  Republicans  call 
Lincoln  the  "martyr"  President,  and  say  "he  fell  a  martyr  in  the 
cause  of  negro  freedom."  Those  who  well  knew  him  assert  he 
was  wholly  indiflFerent  to  the  fat'e  of  the  negroes.  Piatt  tes- 
tifies that  Lincoln  "had  no  more  sympathy  for  the  negro  race 
than  he  had  for  the  horse  he  worked  or  the  hog  he  killed." 
in  all  history  I  know  of  no  public  man  who  possessed  less  of  the 
stufif  martyrs  are  made  of  than  Lincoln.  Was  ever  a  martyr 
"eager  for  worldly  honors?"  Did  any  man  with  three  drops  of 
martyr  blood  in  his  heart  deem  "popularity  the  greatest  good  in 
life?"  Would  any  man,  zealous  in  the  cause  of  negro  freedom, 
run  out  of  the  town  to  avoid  speaking  on  the  subject?  Self- 
seeking  politicians  are  too  common  for  one  to  wonder  at  Mr. 
Lincoln's  self-seeking  nature ;  such  traits  might  be  passed  quietly 
by  but  for  the  fact  that  he  is  held  up  before  the  youth  of  this 
country  as  the  model  man  whom  they  must  emulate  and  revere. 
The  very  writers  who  record  the  ignoble  traits  of  Mr.  Lincoln's 
character  themselves  seem  to  be  unconscious  of  the  mean  nature 
of  such  traits.  Herndon  and  Lamon  both  picture  the  scene  in 
which  Mr.  Lincoln  stands  up  the  central  figure  in  a  rowdy  crowd 
of  men,  swinging  about  his  head  a  bottle  of  whiskey,  vaunting 
himself,  shouting  out,  "I  am  the  big  buck  of  the  lick !  If  any 
man  wants  to  fight,  let  him  come  on  and  whet  his  horns !"  Yet 
neither  of  these  lovers  of  Mr.  Lincoln  seem  to  see  the  scene  as 
any  ordinary  man  of  refinement  must  see  it. 

On  page  341  of  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln  we  find  this: 
"Mr.  Douglas'  great  success  in  obtaining  place  and 
distinction  (in  advance  of  Mr.  Lincoln)  was  a  standing  of- 
fense to  Mr.  Lincoln's  self-love  and  individual  ambition. 
He  was  intensely  jealous  of  Douglas  and  longed  to  pull  him 
down  and  outstrip  him  in  the  race  for  popular  favor,  which 
both  considered  the  chief  end  of  man." 

1  f  this  be  true,  and  I  have  found  nothing  in  any  history  of 


Chap.  9  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  45 

Mr.  Lincoln's  life  (except  unsupported  assertions)  to  contradict 
its  trntli,  it  shows  a  man  of  mean  and  selfish  nature.  Jealousy 
is  a  feeling  born  of  selfishness.  No  generous,  large-minded  man 
or  woman  can  be  jealous  of  another's  success.  In  the  case  of 
Lincoln  and  Douglas,  it  appears  that  neither  man  was  inspired 
by  any  feeling  higher  than  the  desire  for  his  own  individual  suc- 
cess ;  neither  seems  to  have  cherished  the  hope  of  serving  his  fel- 
low-men. Since  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  Republican  writ- 
ers and  politicians  assert  and  re-assert  the  fiction  that  from  boy- 
hood up  the  great  ambition  of  Lincoln's  heart  was  to  free  slaves. 
This  is  false,  as  those  few  who  knew  Lincoln  well  have  stated 
time  and  again.  The  foregoing  extracts  from  Herndon  throws 
some  light  on  Mr.  Lincoln's  political  character.  I  will  now  give 
extracts  from  Herndon  and  Lamon,  showing  Mr.  Lincoln's  every 
dav  social  life — the  amusements  and  the  companions  he  was  fond 
of.' 

Herndon  says: 

"Lincoln's  highest  delight  was  to  be  in  the  midst  of  a 
crowd  of  rowdy  men,  engaged  in  a  fist  fight  with  some  man, 
while  the  crowd  betted  on  the  result.  Money,  whiskey, 
knives,  tobacco,  all  sorts  of  small  properties  were  at  stake. 
Lincoln  was  uncommonly  muscular.  It  is  related  that  he 
could  lift  a  barrel  of  whiskey  and  drink  out  of  its  bung  hole. 
Lincoln's  next  highest  delight  was  in  talking  over  these  fist 
fights." 

Lamon  and  Herndon  both  say : 

"Lincoln  was  extremely  fond  of  horse  races  and  cock 
fights,  and  had  a  passion  to  spin  yarns  on  street  corners  or 
in  grocery  stores  (dram  shops)  to  a  crowd  of  boys.  Yarns 
always  too  vulgar  to  be  repeated.  These  yarns  Lincoln 
would  tell  in  the  presence  of  preachers.  He  could  not  realize 
the  oflFense  of  telling  a  vulgar  yarn  if  a  preacher  was  pres- 
ent." 

It  is  to  be  hoped  the  great  majority  of  self-respecting  men 
will  not  tell  vulgar  yarns  in  anybody's  presence. 

Hapgood  calls  Lincoln's  passion  for  fist  fights,  cock  fights 
and  horse  races  "an  innocent  sporting  tendency."  Is  there  a 
Christian  mother  or  father  in  America  who  would  not  be  pained 
to  know  their  sons  indulged  in  "innocent  sporting  tendencies"  of 
this  sort? 

Mr.  Holland  boldly  says  of  this  period  of  Lincoln's  life : 


46  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.      9 

"He  was  a  man  after  God's  own  pattern." 
Holland    makes    this    remarkable    statement : 

"Living-  among'  the  roughest  men,  man\  addicted  to  the 
coarsest  vices,  Lincoln  never  acquired  a  vice.  There  was  no 
taint  on  his  moral  character.  No  stimulant  ever  entered 
his  lips.     X'o  profanity  ever  came  from  them." 

Lamon,  Herndon,  Dennis  Hanks  (Lincoln's  cousin,  brought 
up  in  the  same  town  with  Lincoln,  as  intimate  as  a  brother),  and 
others  testif\  that  Lincoln  drank  whiskey  drams,  but  he  was  not 
a  drunkard.  Lamon  says  Lincoln  always  took  his  dram  when 
asked,  and  ])layed  seven-up  at  night  and  made  a  good  game. 
Holland  admits  Lincoln's  passion  for  telling  "vulgar  stories,  too 
indecent  to  be  printed."  To  many  persons  this  passion  appears 
to  be  a  verv  serious  vice— a  vice  if  indulged  in  by  sons  or  daugh- 
ters would  deeply  pain  any  decent  parent. 

Mr.  Hay,  present  Secretary  of  State,  said  of  Lincoln:  "He 
was  the  finest  character  since  Christ."  It  is  hardly  possible  that 
Mr.  Hay  was  ignorant  of  Lincoln's  real  character.  It  is  hardly 
possible  that  he  did  not  know  the  opinions  which  Lincoln's  con- 
temporaries in  \\'ashington  City  held  of  him  during  his  life.  Yet 
in  support  of  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  Mr.  Hay  thinks  it  nec- 
essary to  talk  twaddle  about  Mr.  Lincoln. 

"Abe,"  says  Lamon  (page  56),  never  liked  ardent  spir- 
its, but  he  took  his  dram  as  others  did.  He  was  a  natural 
politician,  extremely  ambitious  and  anxious  to  be  popular. 
For  this  reason,  and  this  alone,  he  drank  with  the  boys.  If 
he  could  have  avoided  drinking  without  giving  offense,  he 
gladly  would  have  done  it.  But  he  coveted  the  applause  of 
his  pot-companions,  and  because  he  could  not  get  it  other- 
wise, he  made  pretense  of  enjoying  his  liquor  as  they  did. 
The  people  drank,  and  Abe  was  always  for  doing  what  the 
people  did.  Abe  was  often  at  the  Gentryville  grocerv,  and 
would  stay  long  at  night,  telling  stories  and  cracking  jokes." 

"Pot-companions,"  and  this  is  the  man  Republicans  tell  our 
boys  was  like  unto  Christ.  Do  these  men  wish  to  make  infitlels 
of  American  boys?  How  can  any  boy  reverence  Jesus  of  Naz- 
areth if  he  believes  he  was  like  Abraham  Lincoln?  Drank  drams 
and  told  indecent  stories  to  his  "pot-companions." 

Mr.  Herndon's  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln  says: 

"Lincoln   disliked   the   society   of  ladies.     He   wriggled 
and  squirmed  when  in  their  presence,  anxious  to  get  away." 


Chap.  9  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  47 

Some  of  Lincoln's  bioijraphies.  written  according  to  the 
apotheo.sis  plan,  boldly  assert  that  Lincoln  was  very  fond  of  the 
society  of  refined  ladies.  Refined  ladies  were  the  sort  Lincoln 
most  disliked — he  felt  restrained  in  their  presence.  X^o  man  who 
knew  Lincoln  said  he  was  fond  of  ladies'  society. 

Herndon  says : 

"Lincoln  was  the  soul  of  honesty,  lie  was  called  Hon- 
est Abe  Lincoln." 

"Honesty  was  Lincoln's  polar  star." 

Mr.  Lincoln  appears  not  to  have  possessed  what  is  called 
the  "money  grip."  Lie  cared  little  for  money.  He  never  made 
exorbitant  charges  for  his  law  services.  Money  was  not  his  pas- 
sion. His  instincts  did  not  lead  him  into  crooked  ways  to  get 
money,  or  mto  mean  ways  to  keep  it.  Politics  was  Lincoln's  pas- 
sion. \\'as  he  honest  in  politics?  Both  Lamon  and  Herndon 
testify  that  he  deceived  and  used  trickery  to  gain  votes.  Is  it 
not  as  dishonest  to  gain  votes  by  false  pretense  as  to  gain  money? 
Are  American  boys  to  be  taught  that  political  dishonesty  is  hon- 
orable? But,  on  money  matters,  as  on  other  questions.  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's biographers  have  hazy  ideas  of  honest}'.  Instance  the 
following  story  applaudingly  related  by  Lamon  and  other  biog- 
raphers :  \A'hen  Lincoln  was  nineteen  years  old  he  hired  to  Mr. 
Gentry  to  go  with  his  young  son,  Allen  Gentry,  on  a  flatboat  down 
the  Mississippi  River  on  a  trading  trip.  The  boat  was  loaded 
with  produce  to  be  sold  to  farmers  settled  on  the  river  bank.  Lin- 
coln's duty  was  to  help  row  the  boat  and  help  sell  the  produce, 
for  which  he  was  paid  eight  dollars  per  month.  In  the  course 
of  his  business,  yotmg  Gentry  received  a  quantity  of  counterfeit 
money.  "Never  mind,"  said  Lincoln,  "I  will  pass  it  off  on  some 
other  fellow,"  which  he  did.     Of  this  transaction.  Lamon  says: 

"The  trip  of  young  Gentry  and  Lincoln  was  a  very  prof- 
itable one.  Abe  displayed  his  genius  for  mercantile  affairs 
by  handsomely  passing  off  on  the  innocent  folks  along  the 
river  some  counterfeit  money  which  had  been  imposed  on 
yoimg  Gentry." 

Shall  the  youth  of  this  country  be  taught  that  to  "pass  coun 
terfeit  money  on  innocent  folks"  displays  "genius  for  mercantile 
affairs?"     To  applaud  dishonesty  is  to  teach  dishonesty.     After 
relating  the  counterfeit  money  story.  Lamon   put  the  following 
note  at  the  bottom  of  the  page : 


48  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.      9 

"It  must  be  remembered  that  counterfeit  money  was  the 
principal  currency  along  the  river  at  that  period." 

This  is  not  true.  It  has  always  been  in  this  country  a  pen- 
itentiary offense  to  pass  counterfeit  money.  The  settlers  along 
the  river  were  neither  fools  nor  savages.  Many  were  educated 
men  and  women,  emigrants  from  the  Atlantic  States.  They  well 
knew  the  danger  and  dishonesty  of  passing  counterfeit  money. 
I  have  talked  on  this  subject  with  old  men  who  lived  on  the  river 
bank  at  that  time.  They  assure  me  it  was  always  known  to  be  as 
dishonest  to  pass  counterfeit  money  as  to  steal,  and  men  caught 
so  doing  were  tried  and  sent  to  the  penitentiary,  as  the  law  com- 
manded. 

"Lincoln,"  says  Herndon,  "was  tender-hearted."  Many  of 
Lincoln's  biographers  dwell  on  this  tender-hearted  virtue.  Don 
Piatt  made  a  study  of  Lincoln's  character ;  says  he  was  not  tender- 
hearted. On  the  contrary,  was  callous  and  unfeeling.  Of  this, 
more  anon.  After  stating  that  his  friend  Lincoln  was  tender- 
hearted, Herndon  relates  the  following: 

"When  about  twenty-one  years  old.  Lincoln  hired  for  $8 
per  month  to  work  on  a  flatboat  going  to  New  Orleans  with 
a  load  of  grain  and  live  stock.  He  and  two  other  men  under- 
took to  drive  a  drove  of  hogs  on  the  boat.  The  animals 
would  not  walk  the  plank  leading  from  the  land  to  the  boat. 
They  would  run  past  the  plank.  Lincoln  suggested  that 
they  should  blind  the  hogs  by  sewing  their  eyes  up.  Being 
very  strong.  Lincoln  caught  the  hogs  one  by  one.  held  their 
heads  tightly.  A  second  man  held  the  feet,  while  the  third 
man,  with  needle  and  thread,  sewed  up  the  animals'  eyelids 
so  they  could  not  see.  This  device  did  not  succeed.  The 
hogs  still  refused  to  walk  the  plank.  Then  the  strong  Lin- 
coln again  seized  the  hogs  one  by  one.  carried  them  on  the 
boat,  held  their  heads  as  in  a  vice  while  another  man  cut  the 
stitches  and  restored  vision  to  the  animals." 

Was  this  tender-heartedness^  Biographers  give  anecdotes 
like  the  above,  apparently  blind  to  their  repulsive  nature.  The 
following  is  also  related  by  Herndon,  who  was  told  the  story  by 
Mr.  Lincoln,  as  he  (Lincoln)  said,  "to  illustrate  a  scientific  fact." 

"It  was  Lincoln's  duty,  when  a  youth  in  his  father's 
house,  to  put  a  sack  of  corn  on  the  old  mare,  ride  to  the  mill 
and  grind  it.  Each  man's  animal  was  expected  to  work  the 
mill  machinery,  and  each  man  made  his  animal  do  the  work. 


Chap.  9  Facts' and  Falsehoods.  49 

As  the  old  Lincoln  mare  plodded  round  and  round,  Lincoln 
applied  the  lash,  and  with  every  lash,  to  hurry  her  into  fast- 
er movements,  Lincoln  yelled  out,  "Get  up,  you  old  huzzy!" 

Even  an  old  "huzzy"  resents  injustice.  After  the  old  mare 
had  patiently  borne  many  lashes,  just  as  young  Lincoln  said  "get 
up"  for  the  fiftieth  time,  her  patience  gave  out,  she  lifted  her 
hind  foot  and  landed  it  square  between  Lincoln's  eyes,  and  he  fell 
insensible  and  lay  insensible  all  night.  On  coming  to  conscious- 
ness he  finished  the  sentence  cut  short  by  the  mare's  heels,  shout- 
ing "you  old  huzzy!" 

Is  it  insanity  or  pure  mendacity  to  liken  a  man  of  this  na- 
ture to  the  gentle  and  loving  Nazarene  ?  Who  for  an  instant  can 
imagine  Jesus  swinging  a  bottle  of  whiskey  around  his  head, 
swearing  to  the  rowdy  crowd  that  he  was  the  "big  buck  of  the 
lick?"  Or  with  a  whip  in  his  hand,  lashing  a  faithful  old  slave 
at  every  round  of  her  labor?  Who  can  imagine  Jesus  sewing  up 
hogs'  eyes?  What  act  of  Lincoln's  life  betrays  tender-hearted- 
ness? Was  he  tender-hearted  when  he  made  medicine  contra- 
band of  war?  When  he  punished  women  caught  with  a  bottle 
of  quinine  going  South  ?  The  laws  of  war  of  all  civilized  people 
exempt  surgeons'  and  hospital  supplies  from  capture  or  intent  of 
harm.  Not  only  did  Lincoln  prevent  medicine  from  going  South, 
but  when  the  whole  South  was  devastated,  when  she  was  unable, 
properly,  to  feed  and  medicine  the  Union  soldiers  in  her  pris- 
ons, the  Southerners  paroled  a  Federal  prisoner  and  sent  him  with 
a  message  to  Lincoln,  informing  him  of  the  South's  condition 
in  that  respect,  and  telling  him  if  he  would  send  his  own  surgeons 
with  medical  supplies  they  would  be  allowed  to  minister  to  the 
needs  of  the  Union  men  in  prison.  Lincoln  refused.  Was  this 
tender-hearted?  When  Greeley  implored  Lincoln  not  to  inaugu- 
rate war  on  the  South,  and  told  him  if  he  "rushed  on  carnage" 
he  would  clearly  put  himself  in  the  wrong,  was  it  tender-hearted 
to  despise  Greeley's  prayer,  rush  on  carnage,  and  for  four  years 
drench  the  whole  Southland  with  human  blood?  And  when  Lin- 
coln's legions  were  devastating  the  South,  when  with  wanton  cru- 
elty, at  the  point  of  the  bayonet,  Sherman  drove  15,000  women 
and  children  of  Atlanta,  Georgia,  out  of  their  homes,  out  of  the 
city,  to  wander  in  the  woods,  shelterless,  foodless,  and  then  laid 
the  whole  city  in  ashes,  did  Lincoln  give  one  thought  to  the  suf- 
ferings of  those  innocent  women  and  children?  Did  he  once,  dur- 
ing the  four  years  of  the  cruel  war,  utter  or  write  one  kind  word 


50  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.       9 

of  the  people  on  whom  he  had  brought  such  unspeakable  misery  ? 
When  some  of  the  South's  naval  men  were  captured,  and  Lin- 
coln ordered  that  they  should  be  hanged  as  pirates,  and  threw 
them  in  loathsome  dungeon  cells  to  await  hanging,  was  that  ten- 
der-hearted ?  In  the  last  war  between  Germany  and  France,  how 
much  wore  huiranely  did  the  conquering  Germans  treat  the  con- 
quered French?  \\'hen  Butler,  sometimes  called  "the  beast,"  in 
public  speeches  made  in  Xorthern  cities,  in  newspapers,  in  legends, 
put  up  in  big  letters  in  his  office,  defamed  and  denounced  the 
women  of  New  Orleans  as  ''she  adders"  and  "she  devils,  "  and 
issued  Order  28.  which  shocked  all  the  civilized  people  of  earth 
(  except  Russians  and  the  Republican  party),  did  Lincoln  sav  one 
kind  word  of  those  so  basely  wronged  women  of  New  Orleans? 
In  Butler's  Book  he  boasts  that  Lincoln,  and  every  other  Repub- 
lican, approved  his  course  in  Xew  Orleans  { including  his  abuse 
and  falsehoods  about  the  women  of  that  city,)  and  the  infamous 
Order  2S.  which  licensed  his  soldiery  to  insult  and  assault  women 
at  their  pleasure.  When,  befouled  all  over  by  that  foul  order.  But- 
ler went  from  Xew  Orleans  to  Washington  City,  not  one  of  the 
foreign  ministers  called  on  Butler  except  the  Russian.  In  his 
history  of  the  L'nited  States.  Rhodes  virtually  charges  Butler 
with  telling  falsehoods  about  a  certain  transaction  between  him 
and  Grant,  but  Avhen  Butler  basely  defames  and  lies  outright  on 
evciy  woman  in  X'ew  Orleans,  Rhodes  is  ready  enough  to  accept 
his  lies  as  gospel  truths,  without  any  attempt  at  investigation.  Such 
is  the  justice  of  Republican  writers.  The  customs  of  civilized 
people  forbid,  in  wars,  the  destruction  of  growing  vines 
and  crops,  and  the  wanton  burning  of  private  homes.  These  cus- 
toms or  laws  were  trampled  imder  foot  by  the  Repul>lican  party 
and  its  invading  legions,  and  Lincoln  exultantly  congratulated 
his  generals  for  the  cruel  work  they  did.  The  generals  of  the 
army  were  expressly  ordered  to  destroy  everything,  to  make  the 
Southland  a  desert  waste.  A\'hile  Sheridan  was  engaged  in  this 
rcnoi .-eless  work,  Grant  telegraphed  him.  "Do  all  the  damage 
vciu  can.  Destrov  the  crops.  We  want  the  Shenandoah  Valley 
a  barren  waste.  We  want  \'irginia  clear  and  clean,  so  that  a 
crow  flying  over  it  will  have  to  carry  his  ration  or  starve  to 
death,"  For  one  whole  month  Sheridan  and  his  legions  carried 
on  this  cruel  work,  and  at  last  when  the  valley  indeed  was  a 
desert  waste,  and  thousands  of  women  and  children  wandered 
in  the  woods  and  fields,  homeless  and  hungry.  Lincoln,  the  ten- 
der-hearted (God  save  the  mark!)  gleefully  sent  a  telegram  of 
congratulation  to  Sheridan. 


Chap.  9  Pacts  and  Falshiiodds.  51 

"I  tender  you  and  your  brave  army  my  thanks,"  said 
Lincoln,  "and  the  thanks  of  the  Nation,  and  my  personal 
admiration  for  your  month's  operation  in  Shenandoah  Val- 
ley, and  especially  for  the  splendid  work." 

The  "'especially  splendid  work"  that  pleased  Lincoln  was 
the  cruel  work  of  burning  homes  and  turning  women  and  chil- 
dren out  into  the  devastated  fields  to  starve  and  die.  Lincoln 
took  it  upon  himself,  as  all  despots  do.  to  speak  for  the  X^ation. 
If  by  the  "Nation"  is  meant  the  great  body  of  people,  the  large 
majority,  Mr.  Lincoln  had  no  right  to  assume  that  the  Northern 
Nation  thanked  Sheridan  for  his  remorseless  work.  The  Na- 
tion's sympathies  at  that  time  were  with  the  South.  On  page 
47  of  the  \\'eik"s  and  Herndon  Story  of  a  Great  Life  is  the  fol- 
lowing story: 

"In  the  noted  fight  between  Abraham  Lincoln's  step- 
brother and  \\'illiam  Grigsby,  John  Johnson  (the  step- 
brother), William  Grigsby  and  Abe  himself  played  a  stirring 
part.  Taylor's  brother  was  the  second  for  Johnson ;  Wil- 
liam White  was  Grigsby's  second.  They  had  a  terrible  fight. 
It  soon  became  apparent  that  Grigsby  was  too  much  for  Lin- 
coln's man,  Johnson.  It  had  been  agreed  that  no  one  was  to 
break  the  ring,  but  when  Abe  saw  that  his  man  was  get- 
ting the  worst  of  the  fight  he  burst  through  the  ring,  caught 
Grigsby.  threw  him  off  some  feet  distant :  then  up  stood 
Lincoln,  proud  as  Lucifer,  swinging  a  bottle  of  liquor  over 
his  head  and  swearing  aloud.  T  am  the  big  buck  of  the  lick!' 
he  shouted.  Tf  anybody  doubts  it  let  them  come  on  and 
whet  his  horns.' 

A  general  fight  followed  this  challenge,  at  the  end  of  which 
the  field  was  cleared,  .the  wounded  retired  amid  the  exultant 
shouts  of  the  victors.  In  Lamon's  "Life  of  Lincoln"  the  story  is 
related  thus: 

"The  ground  for  the  fight  was  one  mile  and  a  half  from 
Gentryville.  The  bullies  for  twenty  miles  around  attended ; 
the  friends  of  both  parties  were  present  in  force ;  excitement 
ran  high.  When  Abe's  man,  Johnson,  was  down  and  Bill 
Grigsby  was  on  top,  and  all  the  spectators  swearing  and 
cheering,  crowded  up  to  the  edge  of  the  ring.  Abe  burst  out 
of  the  crowd  into  the  ring,  seized  Grigsby  by  the  heels  and 
threw  him  off ;  then  he  swung  a  bottle  of  whisky  over  his 
head  and  swore  he  was  the  big  buck  of  the  lick.  Not  one  in 
the  large  crowd  cared  to  encounter  the  long  sweep  of  Abe's 


OF  iLU^uK 


52  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     io 

muscular  arms,  and  so  he  remained  master  of  the  Hck.  Not 
content,  however,  with  this  triumph,  he  vaunted  himself  in 
the  most  oflfensive  manner,  made  hostile  demonstrations  to- 
ward Grigsby,  declaring  he  could  whip  him  then  and  there. 
Grigsby  meekly  replied  he  did  not  doubt  it,  but  if  Abe  would 
make  things  even,  and  fight  with  pistols,  he  would  willingly 
give  him  a  fight.  Abe  replied :  'I  am  not  going  to  fool  away 
my  life  on  a  single  shot.'  " 

Is  this  a  man  American  youths  should  be  taught  to  reverence 
and  emulate?  Is  this  a  picture  to  present  for  the  admiration  of 
our  sons  and  daughters?  Yet  of  this  man  apotheosizing  writers 
dare  to  say,  "He  as  nearly  resembles  Christ  as  human  nature 


can." 


CHAPTER  X. 

Mr.  Lincoln  Hates  and  Despises  Christianity.  He  Goes  to  Church 
to  Mock  and  Deride.  "Pious  Lies."  Holland's  Strange  Story. 
Other  Republican  Leaders  Deride  Christianity.  The  Four 
Ws. 

It  is  quite  possible  that  many  true  and  trustworthy  men  have 
been  unbelievers  in  the  Bible  as  the  word  of  God.  Many  men 
liave  doubted  and  denied  the  divinity  of  Christ.  Good  men  have 
claimed  that  Jesus  w^as  only  a  good  man  whose  sublime  moral 
teachings  brought  on  Him  the  wrath  of  rulers.  Mr.  Lincoln's 
unbelief  was  more  aggressive  than  the  ordinary  infidel's ;  he  dis- 
liked and  despised  Christianity  as  if  it  were  an  enemy  to  human- 
ity. He  had  no  appreciation  for  the  sublime  truths  taught  by 
Jesus  of  Nazareth.  Since  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  and  especially 
since  the  contemporaries  of  Mr.  Lincoln  have  nearly  all  passed 
away,  it  has  become  the  custom  of  biographers  to  show  up  Mr. 
Lincoln  as  a  very  religious  man.  Mr.  Holland,  Noah  Brooks  and 
Miss  Tarbell  take  the  lead  of  all  romancers  on  this  subject.  These 
writers  throw  facts  to  the  wind,  and,  as  Gen.  Piatt  puts  it,  fill 
their  pages  with  "pious  lies."  Pious  lies  of  this  nature  greatly 
annoyed  Herndon  and  Lamon.  Both  Herndon  and  Lamon  took 
time  and  labor  trying  to  kill  these  pious  lies,  but  after  Herndon 's 
and  Lamon's  death  pious  lies  became  more  numerous,  bold  and 
audacious  than  ever.  In  his  suppressed  "Life  of  Lincoln"  Hern- 
don says: 

"Lincoln  was  a  deep-grounded  infidel.  He  disliked  and 
despised  churches.  He  never  entered  a  church  except  to 
scolT  and  ridicule.     On  coming  from  a  church  he   would 


I 


Chap,  io  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  53 

mimic  the  preacher.  Before  running  for  any  office  he  wrote 
a  book  against  Christianity  and  the  Bible.  He  showed  it  to 
some  friends  and  read  extracts.  A  man  named  Hill  was 
greatly  shocked  and  urged  Lincoln  not  to  publish  it.  Urged 
it  would  kill  him  politically.  Hill  got  this  book  in  his  hands, 
opened  the  stove  door,  and  it  went  up  in  flames  and  ashes. 
After  that,  Lincoln  became  more  discreet,  and  when  running 
for  office  often  used  words  and  phrases  to  make  it  appear  that 
he  was  a  Christian.  He  never  changed  on  this  subject.  He 
lived  and  died  a  deep-grounded  infidel." 

Lamon,  who  was  very  intimate  with  Lincoln  during  the  lat- 
ter's  Presidency,  as  well  as  before,  says  he  never  changed.  Nico- 
lay  and  Hay  say  the  same.  Yet  since  Lincoln's  deification  nearly 
every  eulogist,  lecturer  and  biographer  of  Lincoln  assert  that  he 
was  a  sincere  Christian.  Many  of  Lincoln's  relations  and  friends 
testify  that  he  scoffed  and  derided  religion  and  the  Bible. 

On  the  subject  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  religious  ideas,  Lamon,  who, 
during  Lincoln's  four  years  in  the  White  House,  was  closer  to 
him  than  any  other  man,  wrote  as  follows  in  1872 : 

"No  phase  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  character  has  been  so  per- 
sistently misrepresented  as  this  of  his  religious  belief.  Not 
that  the  conclusive  testimony  of  many  of  his  intimate  asso- 
ciates and  relations  relative  to  his  frequent  expressions  on 
such  subjects  have  ever  been  wanting,  but  his  great  promi- 
nence in  history,  his  extremely  general  expressions  of  re- 
ligious faith  called  forth  by  the  exigencies  of  his  public  life, 
or  indulged  in  on  occasion  of  private  condolence  have  been 
distorted  out  of  relation  to  their  real  significance  or  mean- 
ing to  suit  the  opinion  or  tickle  the  fancy  of  individuals  or 
parties." 

Mr.  Lamon  might  have  added  to  the  above  the  fact  that 
after  the  Republican  leaders  had  performed  the  apotheosis  cere- 
mony they  deemed  it  best  for  the  honor  and  maintenance  of  their 
party  to  bury  out  of  sight  Mr.  Lincoln's  real  character,  and  to 
pose  him  before  the  world  as  the  greatest  and  purest  man  born 
since  Christ,  and  at  the  same  time  they  decreed  that  from  the 
hour  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  death*  he  was  to  be  pictured  as  a  sincere 
and  true  Christian.  If  Lamon  knew  that  the  Republicans  thought 
it  for  the  interest  of  their  party  that  Mr.  Lincoln  should  be  repre- 
sented as  a  Christian,  he  dared  to  differ  from  them  and  did  his 
best  to  down  falsehoods  on  this  subject.  Some  biographers  assert 
that  "when  a  boy,  Lincoln  was  of  a  grave  and  reHgious  nature; 


54  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     id 

that  he  often  retired  from  company  and  read  the  Bible,  on  his 
knees,  and  otherwise  manifested  a  reverential  and  religious  turn 
of  mind."  Herndon  says  Lincoln  was  deficient  in  reverence  for 
any  thing  or  person.  Lincoln's  stepmother  denied  that  he  ''ever 
went  into  a  corner  to  ponder  the  sacred  writings  and  wet  the 
pages  with  his  tears  of  penitence." 

Dennis  Hanks  is  clear  on  this  point.  He  denied  that  his 
cousin  Abe  was  ever  reverential,  and  denied  that  he  liked  sacred 
songs,  and  testifies  that  the  songs  Lincoln  was  fond  of  were  of 
a  very  questionable  character. 

"When  Lincoln  went  to  church,"  says  Lamon  and 
Hanks,  "he  went  to  mock  and  came  away  to  mimic.  When 
he  went  to  New  Salem  he  consorted  with  free  thinkers  and 
joined  with  them  in  deriding  the  gospel  story  of  Jesus.  He 
wrote  a  labored  book  on  this  subject,  which  his  friend  Hill 
put  in  the  stove  and  burned  up.  Not  until  after  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's death  were  these  facts  denied."  (See  Lamon's  "Life 
of  Lincoln.") 

In  the  face  of  abundant  and  unimpeachable  evidence  proving 
that  Lincoln  was  a  deep-grounded  infidel,  unscrupulous  biogra- 
phers continue  to  assert  that  he  was  a  true  Christian.  Nicolay, 
who  was  Mr.  Lincoln's  private  secretary  during  his  Presidency, 
said  on  this  subject: 

"Mr.  Lincoln  did  not,  to  my  knowledge,  in  any  way 
change  his  religious  views  or  beliefs  from  the  time  he  left 
Springfield  till  his  death." 

HerndoiT,  the  most  faithful  friend  of  Lincoln,  was  so  out- 
raged at  the  falsehoods  put  forth  about  Lincoln's  piety  in  the 
"pretended  biographies"  of  his  life  that  in  1870  he  wrote  a  letter 
to  Lamon,  from  which  the  following  is  taken : 

"In  New  Salem  Mr.  Lincoln  lived  with  a  class  of  men, 
moved  with  them,  had  his  being  with  them.  They  were 
scoffers  of  religion,  made  loud  protests  against  the  follow- 
ers of  Christianity.  They  declared  that  Jesus  was  an  illegiti- 
mate child.  On  all  occasions  that  offered  they  debated  on 
the  various  forms  of  Christianity.  They  riddled  old  divines, 
and  not  infrequently  made  those  very  divines  skeptics  by 
their  logic ;  made  them  disbelievers  as  bad  as  themselves. 
In  1835  Lincoln  wrote  a  book  on  infidelity  and  intended  to 
have  it  published.  The  book  w^as  an  attack  on  the  idea  that 
Jesus  was  Christ.     Lincoln  read  the  book  to  his  friend  Hill. 


Chap,   io  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  55 

Hill  tried  to  persuade  him  not  to  publish  it.  Lincoln  said  it 
should  be  published.  Hill,  believing  that  if  the  book  was 
published  it  would  kill  Lincoln  forever  as  a  politician,  seized 
it  and  thrust  it  in  the  stove.  It  went  up  in  smoke  and  ashes 
before  Lincoln  could  get  it  out.  When  Mr.  Lincoln  was  can- 
didate for  the  Legislature  he  was  accused  of  being  an  infidel, 
and  of  having  said  that  Jesus  was  an  illegitimate  child.  He 
never  denied  it,  never  flinched  from  his  views  on  religion. 
In  1854  he  made  me  erase  the  name  of  God  from  a  speech 
I  was  about  to  make.  He -did  this  to  one  of  his  friends  in 
Washington  City.  In  the  year  1847  Mr.  Lincoln  ran  for 
Congress  against  the  Rev.  Peter  Cartright.  He  was  accused 
of  being  an  infidel ;  he  never  denied  it.  He  knew  it  could 
and  would  be  proved  on  him.  I  know  when  he  left  Spring- 
field for  Washington  he  had  undergone  no  change  in  his 
opinion  on  religion.  He  held  many  of  the  Christian  ideas  in 
abhorrence.  He  held  that  God  could  not  forgive  sinners. 
The  idea  that  Mr.  Lincoln  carried  a  Bible  in  his  bosom  or  in 
his  boots  to  draw  on  his  opponent  is  ridiculous."' 

Lincoln's  cousin,  Dennis  Hanks,  testifies: 

"At  an  early  age  Abe  began  to  attend  the  preachings 
around  about,  but  mostly  at  the  Pigeon  Creek  Church,  with 
a  view  to  catching  anything  that  might  be  ludicrous  in  the 
preaching,  in  the  manner  or  matter,  and  making  it  a  sub- 
ject of  mimicry  as  soon  as  he  could  collect  a  crowd  of  idle 
boys  and  men  to  hear  him.  He  frequently  reproduced  a  ser- 
mon with  nasal  twang,  rolling  his  eyes,  and  all  sorts  of  droll 
aggravations,  to  the  great  delight  of  the  wild  fellows  assem- 
bled. Sometimes  he  broke  out  with  stories  passably  humor- 
ous and  invariably  vulgar." 

In  Lamon's  "Life  of  Lincoln,"  page  55.  he  says: 

"It  is  important  that  this  question  should  be  finally  set- 
tled. The  names  of  some  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  nearest  friends 
are  given  below,  followed  by  clear  and  decisive  statements 
for  which  they  are  responsible,  and  all  of  them  of  high  char- 
acter, men  who  had  the  best  opportunities  to  form  a  correct 
opinion  as  to  Mr.  Lincoln's  religious  ideas." 

The  following  are  samples  of  evidence  on  this  subject.     Mr. 
Jesse  E.  Fall  reluctantly  testifies : 

"Mr.  Lincoln's  friends  were  not  a  little  surprised  at 
finding  in  some  biographies  statements  of  his  religious  opin- 


56  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     10 

ions  so  utterly  at  variance  with  his  known  sentiments.  Lin- 
coln held  opinions  utterly  at  variance  with  what  are  taught 
in  the  churches." 

William  H.  Herndon  testifies: 

"Mr.  Lincoln  told  me  a  thousand  times  that  he  did  not 
believe  that  the  Bible  was  any  revelation  from  God.    I  assert 
this  of  my  own  knowledge ;  others  will  confirm  what  I  say." 
After  Lincoln's  death  his  wife  wrote  Lamon : 

"Mr.  Lincoln  had  no  hope  and-  no  faith  in  Christianity." 
Lamon  testifies  that  "Lincoln  never  changed  his  opinions  of 
the  Christian  religion,  but    he    became    discreet    in    talking    of 
them." 

John  Matthews  testifies  as  follows: 

"I  knew  Mr.  Lincoln  as  early  as  1834;  knew  he  was 
an  infidel.  He  attacked  the  Bible  and  the  New  Testament ; 
he  talked  infidelity,  ridiculed  both  Bible  and  Testament. 
He  often  shocked  me,  he  went  so  far.  He  often  came  into 
the  clerk's  ofiice,  where  I  and  other  young  men  were  writing. 
He  brought  a  Bible  with  him,  read  a  chapter  and  argued 
against  it.  He  wrote  a  book  on  infidelity.  I  was  his  per- 
sonal and  political  friend.  I  never  heard  that  he  changed 
his  views." 

On  page  497  Lamon  says : 

"While  it  is  clear  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  at  all  times  an 
infidel,  it  is  also  very  clear  that  he  was  not  at  all  times  equally 
willing  that  everybody  should  know  it.  He  never  offered  to 
purge  or  recant ;  he  was  a  wily  politician  and  did  not  disdain 
to  regulate  his  religious  manifestations  with  reference  to  his 
political  interest.  He  saw  the  immense  and  augmenting 
power  of  the  churches,  and  in  times  past  had  felt  it.  The 
charge  of  infidelity  had  seriously  injured  him  in  several  of 
his  earlier  political  campaigns.  Aspiring  to  lead  religious 
communities,  he  saw  he  must  not  appear  as  an  enemy  within 
their  gates.  He  saw  no  reason  for  changing  his  convic- 
tions, but  he  saw  many  good  and  cogent  reasons  for  not 
making  them  public." 

In  1865  Mr.  Holland  wrote  (to  borrow  Lamon's  words)  a 
"pretended  Life  of  Lincoln,"  which  shows  lamentable  disregard 
for  truth  and  lamentable  perversion  of  the  moral  sense.  Having 
fully  accepted  the  apotheosis  decree  regarding  the  dead  Presi- 
dent, Mr.   Holland  very  much  desired  to  present  to  the  public 


Chap,   io  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  '  57 

Mr.  Lincoln  as  being  a  good  and  true  Christian.  To  do  this,  in 
the  face  of  strong  evidence  to  the  contrary,  also  in  the  face  of 
the  fact  that  hundreds  of  friends  and  relatives  of  Mr.  Lincoln 
were  still  living,  who  could  and  would  contradict  misstatements, 
was  the  problem  Mr.  Holland  had  to  contend  with.  After  think- 
ing the  matter  over,  Mr.  Holland  finally  inserted  in  his  Life  of 
Lincoln  the  best  story  he  could  find  to  prove  that  Mr.  Lincoln 
was  a  devout  Christian.  If  this  story  be  true,  it  would  show  Mr. 
Lincoln  to  have  been  more  infamous  than  any  open  and  avowed 
infidel  the  world  knows  of.  We  give  the  story  as  given  in  Mr. 
Holland's  Life  of  Lincoln,     The  reader  must  judge  for  himself: 

Extracts  from  Holland's  Life  of  Lincoln: 

"During  one  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  political  campaigns,  a  few 
days  before  the  election,  he  took  a  book  containing  a  careful 
canvass  of  the  city  of  Spring^eld,  showing  the  candidates 
for  whom  each  citizen  had  declared  his  intention  to  vote, 
and  called  Mr.  Newton  Bateman  into  his  office  to  a  seat 
by  his  side,  carefully  locking  the  door.  'Let  us  look  over 
this  book,'  said  Lincoln.  T  particularly  wish  to  see  how  the 
ministers  of  the  churches  are  going  to  vote.'  Newton  Bate- 
man was  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  for  the  State 
of  Illinois.  Turning  over  the  leaves  one  by  one,  Lincoln 
counted  up  the  names ;  then  with  a  face  full  of  sadness  said : 
'Here  are  twenty-three  ministers  of  different  denominations, 
and  all  of  them  are  against  me,  and  here  are  a  great  many 
prominent  members  of  the  churches,  a  very  large  majority 
of  whom  are  against  me.  I  don't  understand  this.  I  am  not 
a  Christian.     God  knows  I  would  be  one.' 

"Drawing  from  his  bosom  a  pocket  Testament,  his 
cheeks  wet  with  tears,  with  a  trembling  voice  he  quoted  it 
(the  Testament)  against  his  political  opponents,  especially 
against  Douglas.  He  said  the  opinions  adopted  by  him  (Lin- 
coln) and  his  party  were  derived  from  the  teachings  of 
Christ,  and  asserted  that  Christ  was  God.  The  Testament 
he  carried  in  his  bosom  he  called  'The  rock  on  which  I 
stand.'  Mr.  Bateman,  himself  a  Christian,  said:  'Mr.  Lin- 
coln, I  had  not  supposed  that  you  were  accustomed  to  think 
so  much  on  this  subject ;  certainly,  your  friends  are  ignorant 
of  the  sentiments  you  have  expressed  to  me.'  'I  know  it.' 
he  replied  promptly.  'T  know  they  are.  I  am  obliged  to 
appear  different  to  them.  I  am  willing  you  should  know 
the  truth.'  " 


^8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     id 

On  this  story  Mr.  Holland  makes  the  following  curious 
comment : 

"Why  Mr.  Lincoln  should  say  he  was  obliged  to  appear 
an  infidel  to  others  does  not  appear.  It  is  more  than  prob- 
able that  on  leaving  Mr.  Bateman,  Lincoln  met  some  of  his 
old  friends,  and  by  a  single  bound  from  his  tearful  and  sub- 
lime religious  passion  he  told  them  some  jest  that  filled  his 
heart  with  mirth  and  awoke  convulsions  of  laughter." 

"Tearful  and  sublime  religious  passion!"  What  apotheosis 
twaddle  is  this!     Of  this  Holland  story  Lamon  says: 

"If  Mr.  Lincoln  told  Bateman  that  he  did  not  under- 
stand why  the  Christian  ministers  and  the  other  religious 
men  refused  to  vote  for  him,  he  spoke  falsely.  Mr.  Lin- 
coln well  knew  they  opposed  him  because  he  was  an  open 
and  avowed  infidel ;  one  who  blatantly  strove  to  make  con- 
verts of  young  Christian  men." 

Both  Bateman  and  Holland  were  professed  Christians.  If 
one  or  both  together  concocted  this  story  for  the  purpose  of  lift-. 
ing  from  Mr.  Lincoln  the  stigma  of  infidelity,  their  moral  sense 
must  have  been  singularly  perverted  not  to  see  that  the  story 
they  told  would  cover  Mr.  Lincoln  with  blacker  infamy  than 
any  unbelief  in  Christianity  could  possibly  do.  I  can  conceive 
of  no  greater  baseness  than  the  acts  this  Holland-Bateman  story 
attributes  to  Mr.  Lincoln.  That  man  must  be  utterly  conscience- 
less, not  to  say  fiendishly  malignant,  who,  himself  convinced  of 
the  truth,  the  saving  grace  of  Christianity,  uses  his  power  of 
logic,  his  power  of  sarcasm,  his  gift  of  eloquence,  to  turn  Chris- 
tian men  and  youths  against  the  faith  he  himself  believed  to  be 
divine !  Unimpeachable  evidence  proves  that  Mr.  Lincoln  often 
seized  occasions  to — 

"Go  into  offices  where  young  men  were  writing,  with  a 
Bible  in  his  pocket,  from  which  he  would  read  chapters 
and  verses  and  then  denounce,  deride  and  argue  against 
the  Bible  and  Christianity." 

It  is  proved  that  Mr.  Lincoln,  with  others  of  like  nature, 
would  get  together  and  scofif  at  the  Christian  faith,  calling  Jesus 
an  impostor,  a  bastard  child,  and  other  opprobious  epithets.  Yet 
Mr.  Holland  would  have  his  readers  believe  that  all  the  time 
Lincoln  was  doing  his  best  to  bring  contempt  on  Christianity  he 
himself  was  a  devoutly  religious  man.  Some  biographers  ignore 
all  evidence  and  serenely  persist  in  the  assertion  that  Mr.  Lin- 


Chap,   io  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  59 

coin  was  a  fervent  Christian  and  was  "often  seen  on  his  knees 
before  an  open  Bible,  praying,  while  the  tears  streamed  down 
his  face."  Biographers  of  this  sort  write  under  the  full  glare 
of  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  which  blinds  the  vision  of  all  faith- 
ful Republicans. 

In  Mr.  Holland's  "pretended"  Life  of  Lincoln  is  the  fol- 
lowing : 

"Mr.  Lincoln  will  always  be  remembered  as  eminently 
a  Christian  President.  Conscience,  not  popular  applause,  not 
love  of  power,  was  the  ruling  motive  of  Lincoln's  life.  There 
was  no  taint  to  Lincoln's  moral  character.  No  stimulant 
ever  entered  his  mouth ;  no  profanity  ever  came  from  his 
lips." 

"The  people  all  drank,"  says  Lamon  ;  "even  the  women  drank 
whiskey  toddies.  The  men  took  whiskey  straight.  Abe  was  al- 
ways for  doing  what  the  people  did,  right  or  wrong.  Dennis 
Hanks,  Lincoln's  cousin,  brought  up  with  him,  wrote  to  Hern- 
don,  who  was  then  writing  Lincoln's  Life,  saying:  'Go  the 
whole  hog ;  keep  nothing  back  about  Lincoln.'  Hanks  was  op- 
posed  to   whitewashing." 

Hapgood,  page  183,  says: 

"All  the  clergy  in  Springfield  voted  against  Lincoln." 

Other  great  Republican  leaders  in  that  cruel  period  not 
only  had  no  faith  in  Christianity,  but  so  hated  it  they  never 
missed  a  chance  to  cast  scorn  and  gibes  at  its  founder.  The 
Lancaster  (Pa.)  Intelligencer,  published  at  the  home  of  Thad- 
deus  Stevens,  said  of  him : 

"During  all  his  lifetime  Thaddeus  Stevens  has  openly 
scoffed  at  the  Christian  religion.  Some  years  before  the 
war,  while  trying  a  case  in  another  part  of  the  State,  one 
of  the  lawyers  quoted  from  the  Bible.  'Oh,'  retorted  Stev- 
ens, 'the  Bible  is  nothing  but  obsolete  history  of  a  barbarous 
people.'  " 

In  a  speech  made  during  the  impeachment  proceedings, 
Stevens  referred  to  the  Savior  as  that  "individual  Judas  Iscariot 
betrayed." 

Carl  Schurz  was  a  reviler  of  Christianity.  Schurz  thought 
it  fine  wit  to  refer  to  Jesus  of  Nazareth  as  "that  ideal  gentle- 
man beyond  the  skies  called  by  some  people  God."  Some  of 
those  leaders  not  only  cast  aside  religious  restraints,  but  cut 
themselves  loose  from  the  ordinary  rules  of  decency.     Senator 


6o  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     ii 

McDonald  boasted  that  he  had  planted  his  feet  on  the  platform 
of  the  four  Ws,  "Wine,  Whiskey,  Women,  War." 

Thaddeus  Stevens  was  so  pleased  with  this  he  boasted  that 
his  feet  also  stood  on  that  platform. 

The  cruel  and  utterly  unjust  war  waged  on  the  South  by 
the  Republican  party  in  the  6o's  seems  to  have  obliterated  every 
vestige  of  moral  conscience,  and  all  sense  of  right  and  wrong  in 
some  of  the  politicians  of  that  party.  Instance  the  following 
paragraph,  cut  from  a  Republican  journal,  the  Globe-Democrat 
of  St.  Louis,  October  17,  1897.  The  Globe-Democrat  editor,  dis- 
cussing which  of  two  courses  his  party  should  pursue,  com- 
placently remarks : 

"It  matters  not  which  we  do,  but  we  must  all  do  the 
same.  'Which  is  our  scoundrel?'  asked  Thaddeus  Stevens, 
in  one  of  the  controversies  growing  out  of  the  reconstruc- 
tion policy,  'that  we  may  all  defend  him.'  " 

To  defend  their  party's  dead  or  living  scoundrels  is  the  high- 
est duty  of  Republicans.  Thad  Stevens'  proposition  was  worthy 
of  him  and  of  the  heUish  policy  he  was  discussing. 

CHAPTER  XL 

Lincoln's  Singular  Treatment  of  the  Lady  He  Four  Times  Asked 
to  Marry  Him.  His  Curious  Letter  About  That  Lady.  His 
Cruel  Treatment  of  Miss  Todd.     His  Home  a  Hell  on  Earth. 

Herndon  and  Lamon  both  say  that  Mr.  Lincoln  proposed 
marriage  to  three  women.  The  first  was  Miss  Rutledge,  who 
was  already  engaged  to  a  man  whom  she  truly  loved,  who  had 
gone  East  and  remained  so  long  her  family,  thinking  he  had 
forgotten  his  engagement,  persuaded  her  to  accept  Lincoln's 
offer.  Herndon,  in  his  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln,  says  that 
Miss  Rutledge  could  not  love  Lincoln,  and  before  marriage  pined 
and  died  in  the  belief  that  her  first  and  only  love  had  forgotten 
her.  This  was  an  error ;  the  lover  had  suffered  a  long  and  tedious 
illness  and  returned  to  find  the  girl  dead.  The  second  woman 
Lincoln  courted  was  a  Miss  Owens  of  Kentuckv.  Herndon  de- 
scribes  Miss  Owens  as  a  handsome,  well-educated,  bright  young 
woman,  just  one  year  older  than  Lincoln,  weighing  150  pounds, 
and  having  some  fortune.  Lincoln  was  twenty-eight.  Miss  Owens 
twenty-nine  years  old.  The  age  and  weight  of  this  lady  cut  an 
important  figure  in  this  affair,  and  should  be  borne  in  mind  by 
the  reader.     Lincoln  himself  tells  the  story  of  his  courtship  of 


Chap,  i  i  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  6i 

Miss  Owens  in  a  letter  to  his  friend,  Mrs.  Browning.     Both  La- 
mon  and  Herndon  insert  this  letter  verbatim  in  their  story  of 
Lincoln's  life.     Lamon  introduces  it  by  the  following  remarks : 
"If  this  letter  could  be  withheld  and  the  act  decently 
reconciled  to  the  conscience  of  the  biographer  professing  to 
be  honest  and  candid,  this  letter  never  should  see  the  light  in 
these  pages.     Its  coarse  exaggeration  in  describing  the  per- 
son the  writer  was  willing  to  marry,  its  imputation  of  'tooth- 
less, weather-beaten  old  age,'  to  a  really  young  and  hand- 
some lady,  its  utter  lack  of  delicacy,  its  defective  orthog- 
raphy, all  this  it  would  be  more  agreeable  to  suppress  than 
to  publish.     But  if  we  begin  to  mutilate  a  document  which 
throws  a  broad  light  on  one  phase  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  char- 
acter, why  may  we  not  do  the  like  as  fast  and  as  often  as  the 
temptation  may  arise?" 

Mutilations  of  this  nature  were  precisely  what  Republican 
writers  were  expected  to  make  in  obedience  to  the  decree  of  the 
apotheosizing  Republican  politicians. 

In  Weik's  and  Herndon's  "Story  of  a  Great  Life"  this  let- 
ter is  published  entire  under  the  heading,  "A  Most  Amusing 
Courtship."  The  letter  itself  Weik  calls  "a  most  ludicrous 
letter." 

Herndon  makes  no  such  comments  in  his  suppressed  Life 
of  Lincoln.     Should  the  son  of  any  honorable  man  or  woman 
write  such  a  letter  about  the  lady  he  had  tried  long  and  hard 
to  get  for  a  wife,  had  proposed  to  her  four  times,  had  never  by 
her  been  deceived  by  word  or  act,  had  been  told  from  the  first 
that  she  could  not  marry  him,  that  father  and  mother  would 
weep  tears  of  shame  and  sorrow  over  such  a  letter.    They  would 
be  unable  to  see  in  it  anything  "amusing,"  anything  "ludicrous." 
Nicolay  and  Hay,  who  dedicated  their  ten  volumes  called 
the  "Life  of  Lincoln"  to  Mr.  Lincoln's  son  Robert,  and  who,  of 
course,  always  held  in  mind  the  purpose  of  pleasing  not  only  the 
son,  but  the  Republican  party,  comment  on  the  letter  as  follows : 
"This  letter  has  been  published  and  severely  criticised 
as  showing  a  lack    of    gentlemanly  feeling,  but  those  who 
take  this  view  forget  that  Lincoln  was  writing  to  an  inti- 
mate friend,  that  he  mentioned  no  names,  and  that  twenty- 
five  years  after,  when  a  biographer  wanted  to  publish  the 
letter,  Mr.  Lincoln  refused  consent  for  the  reason,  as  he 
stated,  'there  is  too  much  truth  in  it  for  print.'" 
Nicolay  and  Hay  seek  to  excuse  the  writing  of  this  letter 
on  the  score  of  youth.    Lincoln  was  twenty-eight.     If  a  man  is 


62  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     ii 

ever  to  possess  g-entlemanly  feeling-,  surely  he  is  old  enough  at 
twenty-eight.  But  even  this  excuse  is  nullified  by  the  fact  that 
twenty-five  years  after  writing  the  letter  Lincoln  exhibited  no 
regret,  no  shame,  no  sense  of  the  gross  impropriety  of  writing 
such  a  letter.  He  refused  to  have  the  letter  given  to  the  public, 
not  because  he  regretted  having  written  it,  but  because  "there 
was  too  much  truth  in  it"  Yet  in  that  letter  was  as  vile  a  slur 
as  man  can  make  at  an  honorable  woman.     Mark  the  sentence: 

"I  knew  she  was  called  an  'old  maid,'  and  I  felt  no  doubt  of 
tlie  truth  of  at  least  one-half  of  the  appellation." 

Is  not  this  intimating  a  doubt  of  the  chastity  of  the  woman 
he  had  four  times  asked  to  be  his  wife?  Had  the  parties  con- 
cern-d  lived  in  the  South,  had  the  lady  been  blessed  with  a  big 
brother  or  a  fiery  father,  had  either  the  one  or  the  other  chanced 
to  see  thnt  letter,  Mr.  Lincoln  would  not  have  lived  long  enough 
to  become  the  first  President  of  the  Republican  party.  The  fol- 
lowing is  a  copy  of  the  letter: 

"Springfield,  April  ist.  1838. 
"Mrs.  O.   H.   Browning: 

"Dear  Madam — Without  apologizing  for  being  egotistical,  I 
shall  make  the  history  of  so  much  of  my  life  as  has  elapsed 
since  I  saw  you,  the  subject  of  this  letter.  And  I  now  discover 
that  in  order  to  give  you  a  full  and  intelligible  account  of  the 
things  I  have  done  and  suffered  since  I  saw  you,  I  shall  have  to 
relate  some  that  happened  before.  It  was  in  the  autumn  of  1836 
that  a  married  lady  of  my  acquaintance,  a  great  friend  of  mine, 
being  about  to  pay  a  visit  to  her  father  and  relations  residing  in 
Kentucky,  proposed  to  me  that  on  her  return  she  would  bring  a 
sister  of  her's  with  her  if  I  would  agree  to  become  her  brother- 
in-law  with  all  convenient  dispatch.  I,  of  course,  accepted  the 
proposal,  for  you  know  I  could  not  have  done  otherwise  had  I 
really  been  averse  to  it,  but  privately,  between  you  and  me,  I 
was  most  confoundedly  well  pleased  with  the  project.  I  had 
seen  the  said  sister  some  three  years  ago.  and  thought  her  intelli- 
gent and  agreeable,  and  saw  no  good  objection  to  plodding  life 
through  hand  in  hand  with  her.  Time  passed,  the  lady  took  her 
journey,  and  in  due  time  returned,  sister  in  company,  sure  enough. 
This  astonished  me  a  little,  for  it  appeared  that  her  coming  so 
readily  showed  she  was  a  trifle  too  willing,  but  on  reflection  it 
occurred  to  me  that  she  might  have  been  prevailed  on  by  her 
married  sister  to  come  without  anything  concerning  me  having 
been  mentioned  to  her,  and  so  I  concluded  that  if  no  other  ob- 
jection presented  itself  I  would  consent  to  waive  this.     All  this 


Chap,  ii  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  63 

occurred  to  me  on  hearing-  of  her  arrival  in  the  neighborhood, 
for  be  it  remembered  I  had  not  seen  her  except  about  three  years 
previous  to  the  above  mentioned.     In  a  few  days  we  had  an  inter- 
view and  although  I  had  seen  her  before,  she  did  not  look  as  my 
imagination  had  pictured  her.     i  knew  she  was  over  size,  but 
now  she  appeared  a  fair  match  for  Falstaff.     I  knew  she  was 
called  an  old  maid,  and  I  felt  no  doubt  of  the  truth  of  at  least  half 
of  the  appellation.     But  now,  when  I  beheld  her,  I  could  not  for 
my  life  avoid  thinking  of  my  mother,  and  this  not  from  withered 
features,  for  her  skin  was  too  full  of  fat  to  permit  of  its  con- 
tracting  into   wrinkles,   but   from   want  of   teeth   and   weather- 
beaten  appearance  in  general,  and  from  a  kind  of  notion  running 
through  my  head  that  nothing  could  have  commenced  at  the 
size  of  infancy  and  reached  her  present  bulk  at  less  than  thirty- 
five  or  forty  years ;  in  short,  I  was  not  at  all  pleased  with  her. 
But  what  could  I  do?     I  had  told  her  sistet  I  would  take  her 
for  better  or  for  worse,  and  I  made  a  point  of  honor  and  con- 
science in  all  things  to  stick  to  my  word,  especially  if  others  had 
been  induced  to  act  on  it,  which  in  this  case  I  had  no  doubt  they 
had  done,  for  I  was  fully  convinced  that  no  other  man  on  earth 
would  have  her,  and  hence  the  conclusion  that  they  were  bent 
on  holding  me  to  my  bargain.     Well,  thought  I,  I  have  said  it, 
and  be  the  consequences  what  they  may,  it  shall  not  be  my  fault 
if  I  fail  to  do  it.    At  onCe  I  determined  to  consider  her  my  wife, 
and  this  done,  all  my  powers  of  discovery  were  put  to  work  in 
search  of  perfections  in  her  which  might  be  fairly  set  off  against 
her  defects.    I  tried  to  imagine  her  handsome,  which  but  for  her 
corpulence  was  actually  true.     Exclusive  of  this,  no  woman  I 
have  ever  seen  had  a  finer  face.     I  also  tried  to  convince  myself 
that  the  mind  was  much  more  to  be  valued  than  the  person,  and 
in  this  she  was  not  inferior,  as  I  could  discover,  to  any  with 
whom  I  had  been  acquainted.     Shortly  after  this,  without  com- 
ing to  any  understanding  with  her,  I  set  out  for  Vandalia,  where 
you  first  saw  me.     During  my  stay  there  I  had  letters  from  her 
which  did  not  change  my  opinion  either  of  her  intellect  or  in- 
tention, but,  on  the  contrary,  confirmed  it  in  both.    All  this  while, 
though  I  was  fixed  firm  as  the  surge-repelling  rock  in  my  reso- 
lution, I  found  I  was  continually  repenting  the  rashness  which 
had  led  me  to  make  it.    Through  life  I  have  been  in  no  bondage, 
either  real  or  imaginary,  from  the  thralldom  of  which  I  so  much 
desired  to  be  free.    After  my  return  home  I  saw  nothing  in  her 
to  make  me  change  my  opinion  of  her  in  any  respect.     I  now 
spent  my  time  in  planning  how  I  might  get  along  through  life 


64  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     ii 

after   my    contemplated    change    of   circumstances    should    have 
taken  place,,  and  how  I  might  procrastinate  the  evil  for  a  time, 
which  I  really  dreaded  as  much,  perhaps  more,  than  the  Irish- 
man does  the  halter.    After  all  my  suffering  on  this  deeply  inter- 
esting subject,  here  I  am  wholly,  unexpectedly,  completely  out  of 
the  scrape,  and  now  I  want  to  know  if  you  can  guess  how  I  got 
out  of  it.     Clear,  in  every  sense  of  the  term  ;  no  violation  of  word, 
honor  or  conscience.     I  don't  believe  you  can  guess,  so  I  may  as 
well  tell  you  at  once.     As  the  lawyer  says,  it  was  done  in  the 
manner  following,  to-wit:     After  I  had  delayed  the  matter  as 
long  as  I  thought  I  could  in  honor  do  (which,  by  the  way,  had 
brought  me  around  to  the  last  of  fall),  I  concluded  I  might  as 
well  bring  it  to  a  consummation  without  further  delay,  and  so 
I  mustered  up  my  resolution  and  made  the  proposal  to  her  direct, 
but,  shocking  to  relate,  she  said  'No.'    At  first  I  thought  she  did 
it  through  an  affectation  of  modesty,  which  I  thought  but  ill 
became  her,  under  the  peculiar  circumstances  of  her  case,  but 
on  my  renewal  of  the  charge  I  found  she  repeated  it  with  greater 
firmness  than  ever.     I  tried  again  and  again,  but  with  the  same 
success,  or,  rather,  the  same  want  of  success.    I  finally  was  forced 
to  give  it  up,  at  which  I  very  unexpectedly  found  myself  morti- 
fied almost  beyond  endurance.    I  was  mortified,  it  seemed  to  me, 
in  a  hundred  different  ways.     My  vanity  was  deeply  wounded 
by  the  reflection  that  I  had  been  too  stupid  to  discover  her  inten- 
tions, and  at  the  same  time  never  doubting  that  I  understood  them 
perfectly,  and  that  she  whom  I  had  taught  myself  to  believe  no- 
body  else   would  have,   had  actually   rejected  me,   with  all  my 
fancied  greatness.     And  to  cap  the  whole  thing,  I  had  then  for 
the  first  time  begun  to  suspect  that  I  was  really  a  little  in  love 
with  her.     But  let  it  all  go;    I'll  try  and  outlive  it.     Others  have 
been  made  fools  of  by  the  girls,  but  this  can  never  with  truth' 
be  said  of  me.    I  most  emphatically  in  this  instance  made  a  fool  of 
myself.     I  have  now  come  to  the  conclusion  of  never  again  to 
think  of  marrying,  and  for  this  reason  I  can  never  be  satisfied 
with  any  one  who  would  be  blockheaded  enough  to  have  me. 
Your  sincere  friend,  A.  Lincoln.'^ 

If  this  appears  rough  treatment  cf  the  lady  who  refused  to 
marry  Mr.  Lincoln,  what  will  be  thovi^ht  of  his  treatment  of 
the  lady  who  consented  to  marry  him?  After  Miss  Owens,  Lin- 
coln courted  Miss  Todd,  who  is  described  by  Herndon  and  La- 
mon  as  a  handsome,  well-educated  young  lady  of  a  fine  old  Ken- 
tucky family.  Like  Miss  Owens,  Miss  To  Id  was  in  Springfield 
on  a  visit  to  a  married  sister.    The  day  was  set  for  the  marriage, 


Chap,  ii  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  65 

or  rather  the  night  of  January  ist,  1841.  The  guests  were  in- 
vited and  duly  arrived ;  the  feast  was  spread,  the  bride  was  ar- 
rayed in  all  her  beauty  and  finery.  They  waited  the  coming  of 
the  bridegroom.  But  he  came  not.  A  strange  uneasiness  arose, 
runners  were  sent  out  in  search,  but  they  found  him  not.  When 
all  hope  was  over  the  disappointed,  chagrined,  unhappy  bride  re- 
tired to  her  chamber  to  hide  her  grief  and  shame.  The  guests 
departed,  amazed  and  astounded.  Next  day  the  bride  returned 
to  her  Kentucky  home.  When  morning  came  Lincoln's  friends 
found  him  and  demanded  an  explanation  of  his  extraordinary 
conduct. 

'T  found,"  replied  Lincoln,  "that  I  do  not  love  Miss 
Todd  enough  to  make  her  my  wife." 

When  his  friends  made  Lincoln  understand  how  his  con- 
duct would  be  viewed  he  was  greatly  troubled.  "Popularity  to 
him  was  the  greatest  good  in  life."  To  lose  popularity  would 
indeed  be  a  great  loss  to  Lincoln.  He  was  an  ambitious  poli- 
tician. Lincoln's  friends  urged  him  to  leave  town  until  the  ex- 
citement blew  over.  He  went  to  Speed's  paternal  home,  near 
Louisville,  Ky.,  and  there  remained  three  weeks,  the  guest  of 
Speed's  father.  Modern  biographers  excuse  Lincoln  on  the 
ground  of  insanity.  Herndon,  in  his  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln, 
says  "Lincoln  was  not  insane,  but  much  depressed."  Speed's 
brother,  who  saw  Lincoln  while  at  his  father's  house,  says  he 
was  not  insane.  Joshua  Speed,  Lincoln's  close  friend,  says  "Lin- 
coln was  not  insane,  but  was  depressed,  and  almost  contemplated 
suicide."  The  apotheosizing  biographers  either  make  no  men- 
tion of  the  occurrence  or  declare  he  was  insane.  Hapgood  boldly 
says : 

"When  Lincoln  was  found  next  day  he  was  as  crazy  as  a 
loon."  On  whose  authority  Hapgood  bases  this  assertion  does 
not  appear.  Apotheosizing  writers  care  very  little  for  authority. 
No  writer  during  Lamon's  or  Herndon's  life  dared  assail  the 
veracity  of  either  of  these  men.  Miss  Tarbell,  who  wrote  her 
so-called  Life  of  Lincoln  long  after  his  two  true  friends,  Hern- 
don and  Lamon,  had  passed  away,  attacked  Herndon's  veracity, 
and  makes  a  lame  attempt  to  deny  the  whole  story.  At  the  end 
of  a  year  Miss  Todd  again  visited  her  sister  in  Springfield,  111. 
Mr.  Lincoln,  wishing  to  atone,  again  proposed  marriage,  and  was 
again  accepted.  Herndon  says  that  the  little  boy  of  the  house, 
on  seeing  Mr.  Lincoln  dressing  for  his  marriage,  asked  where  he 
was  going. 

"To  hell,"  was  Mr.  Lincoln's  gloomy  reply. 


66  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap,     ii 

In  his  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln,  Herndon  says : 

"It  literally  ivas  a  hell  to  which  Mr.  Lincoln  went. 
Aliss  Todd  lost  all  love  for  Mr.  Lincoln  that  night  he  inflicted 
upon  her  so  grievous  a  wrong.  She  married  for  revenge, 
and  got  it  in  good  weight.  To  me  it  has  always  .seemed 
plain  that  Mr.  Lincoln  married  Miss  Todd  to  save  his  honor. 
He  sacrificed  his  domestic  peace ;  he  chose  honor,  and  with 
it  years  of  torture,  sacrificial  pangs  and  the  loss  forever  of 
a  happy  home.  As  to  Miss  Todd,  until  that  fatal  night,  Jan- 
uary I  St.,  1841,  she  may  have  loved  Lincoln,  but  his  action 
on  that  night  forfeited  her  affection.  He  had  crushed  her 
proud  spirit.  She  felt  degraded  in  the  eyes  of  the  world. 
Love  fled  at  the  approach  of  revenge.  She  led  her  husband 
a  wild  dance.  She  unchained  the  bitterness  of  a  disappointed 
and  outraged  nature.  Mary  Todd  had  kept  back  all  the  un- 
attractive traits  of  her  character.  Lincoln's  married  life  is  a 
curious  history ;  facts  long  chained  down  are  slowly  coming 
to  the  surface.  It  often  happened  that  Lincoln  would  get 
up  in  the  dead  of  night,  and  go  out  of  his  own  house  to  es- 
cape his  wife.  He  often  went  to  his  law  office  to  sleep  on 
the  old  horsehair  sofa  there.  Mrs.  Lincoln's  temper  was 
something  fearful." 

Illustrating  Mrs.  Lincoln's  violent  temper,  in  the  "True 
Story  of  a  Great  Life"  is  the  following  story :  A  girl  in  the  em- 
ploy of  Mrs.  Lincoln  was  discharged.  The  girl's  uncle  called 
on  Mrs.  Lincoln  to  learn  the  cause  of  such  treatment.  Mrs.  Lin- 
coln met  the  man  at  the  door  and  was  so  infuriated  and  violent 
the  man  was  glad  to  get  safely  away.  But  he  went  at  once  to 
Lincoln's  office  to  exact  from  him  proper  satisfaction.  Lincoln 
listened  to  the  uncle's  story,  then  sadly  said: 

"My  friend,  I  regret  to  hear  this,  but  in  all  candor  I 
ask  you,  can't  you  endure  for  a  few  moments  what  I  have 
had  as  my  daily  portion  for  the  last  fifteen  years?" 

The  uncle  was  disarmed.  Lincoln's  look  of  distress  so  excited 
his  sympathy  he  warmly  shook  his  hand,  and  from  that  day  be- 
came Lincoln's  good  friend.     See  True  Story  of  a  Great  Life, 

vol.  3,  p.  430- 

Nicolay  and  Hay,  of  Lincoln's  marriage  to  Miss  Todd,  say: 
"This  episode  shows  the  almost  abnormal  development 
of  conscience  in  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  was  ready  to  enter  a  mar- 
riage which  he  dreaded  because  he  thought  he  had  given  the 
lady  reason  to  think  he  had  intended  marriage.    We  can  but 


Chap.  12  Facts  and  Fai.sehoods.  ~^      67 

wonder  at  the  nobleness  of  the  character  to  which  it  was 

possible." 

Holland  and  other  apotheosizing  writers  make  no  denial  of 
the  story.  They  simply  tell  of  Lincoln's  marriage  in  1842.  Hap- 
good  calls  Lincoln's  marriage  to  Miss  Todd  "a  mysterious  mar- 
riage/' There  was  no  mystery ;  the  facts  are  plain  enough.  But 
if  Lincoln  did  not  wish  to  marry  Miss  Todd,  why  did  he  not 
break  it  off  in  a  less  painful  way? 

CHAPTER  XII. 

Mr.  Lincoln's  Passion  for  Indecent  Stories.  Mr.  Holland  on  This 
Habit.  Lincoln  "the  Foulest  in  Stories  of  Any  Other  Man." 
Gov.  Andrezvs'  Disgust.  Lincoln  Writes  Indecent  Things. 
He  Dislikes  Ladies'  Society. 

Mr.  Lincoln's  passion  for  indecent  stories  would  be  passed 
over  in  silence  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  Republican  writers 
and  politicians  persist  in  proclaiming  to  the  youth  of  this  country 
that  Mr.  Lincoln  is  the  man  whose  character  they  should  emu- 
late and  revere :  that  he  was  the  purest  and  the  noblest  man  that 
ever  lived ;  that  he  was  a  "servant  and  follower  of  Christ,"  "a 
pure  Christian."     Only  a  short  while  ago  a  speaker  said: 

"Abraham  Lincoln  was  the  first  of  all  men  who  have 
walked  the  earth  since  the  Nazarene." 

Another  speaker  recently  told  his  hearers  that — 
"They  should  give  up  all  hope  of  heaven  if  Lincoln  was 
excluded."  Are  these  men  insincere  en-  ignorant?  If  sincere, 
they  commit  a  great  wrong  by  indorsing,  as  they  do,  a  man  the 
youth  of  this  country  should  not  be  taught  to  revere  or  emu- 
late. 

In  Charles  L.  C.  Minor's  "Real  Lincoln,"  published  in  1901. 
is  this: 

"A  mistaken  estimate  of  Abraham  Lincoln  has  been 
spread  far  and  wide.  Even  in  the  South  an  editorial  in  a 
very  respectable  religious  paper  lately  said  as  follows :  'Our 
country  has  more  than  once  been  singularly  fortunate  in  the 
moral  character  and  admirable  personality  of  its  popular 
heroes.  Washington,  Lincoln  and  Lee  have  been  the  type 
of  characters  that  it  is  safe  to  hold  up  to  the  admiration  of 
their  own  age  and  to  the  imitation  of  succeeding  genera- 
tions.' " 


68    ^'  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     12 

■''  If  this  Southern  editor  had  known  the  real  character  of  Lin- 
coln he  would  have  put  his  pen  and  paper  in  the  fire  before  giving 
such  bad  advice  to  Southern  boys.  In  1866  Mr.  Holland  wrote 
his  Life  of  Lincoln  under  the  full  glare  of  the  apotheosis  cere- 
mony. Although  presenting  Mr.  Lincoln  to  the  public,  closely 
resembling  the  effigy  the  apotheosizers  had  made,  still  Mr.  Hol- 
land did  not  go  so  far  as  to  deny  all  the  facts  he  would  have 
been  glad  to  conceal.  The  whole  country  was  full  of  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's "indecent  yarns,"  which  many  persons  then  living  had 
heard  him  retail.  Mr.  Holland  did  not  dare  to  deny  the  facts, 
or  to  remain  silent  on  the  subject.    He  says : 

"It  is  useless  for  Mr.  Lincoln's  biographers  to  ignore 
this  habit.  The  whole  West,  if  not  the  whole  country,  is  full 
of  these  stories,  and  there  is  no  doubt  at  all  that  he  indulged 
in  them.  Men  who  knew  Mr.  Lincoln  throughout  all  his 
professional  and  political  life  have  said  that  'he  was  the  foul- 
est in  his  jests  and  stories  of  any  man  in  the  country.'  " 

F.  B.  Carpenter,  the  artist  who  painted  Lincoln's  portrait,  did 
not  venture  to  deny  the  obscene  stories,  but  was  vexed  at  Holland 
for  mentioning  them. 

"I  regret,"  wrote  the  amiable  artist,  desiring  to  main- 
■  tain  the  theory  of  Lincoln's  deification,  "that  Dr.  Holland  has 
'    thought  it  worth  while  to  notice  the  stories  going  about  of 

]Mr.   Lincoln's   habitual   indulgence   in  telling  objectionable 
■stories." 

Holland  attempts  to  excuse  Mr.  Lincoln's  passion  for  vul- 
gar yarns  on  the  ground  tliat  "Mr.  Lincoln's  experience  and  con- 
nection with  lawyers  necessarily  induced  familiarity  with  the 
foulest  phases  6f  human  life."  Lawyers  will  be  no  little  aston- 
ished to  hear  that  the  legal  profession  "necessarily  befouls"  the 
minds  of  its  practitioners.  Coming  of  a  family  of  lawyers,  and 
from  a  long  and  wide  acquaintance  with  members  of  the  bar,  the 
present  writer  denies  Mr.  Holland's  assertion  that  the  "prac- 
tice of  law  and  association  with  lawyers  have  a  tendency  to  lead 
the  mind  to  obscenity."  Lawyers  will  compare  favorably  with 
the  medical  profession ;  indeed,  with  any  of  the  Icirned  profes- 
sions, hardly  excepting  the  clerical.     Herndon  say5  : 

"Lincoln  could  never  realize  the  impropriety  ,of  telling- 
vulgar  yarns  in  the  presence  of  a  minister  of  the  gOi'pel." 

Will  a  gentleman  tell  vulgar  yarns  in  anybody's  prejence? 

Rhodes,  page  471,  relates  the  following:*  '       ^ 


Chap.  12  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  69 

"A  leading  member  of  one  of  the  greatest  religious 
organizations  (June  20th,  1864),  which  had  been  passing 
resolutions  and  sending  deputations  to  the  White  House, 
and  was  entrusted  with  the  speech-making  part  of  the  busi- 
ness, publicly  described  the  demeanor  of  Mr.  Lincoln  on 
that  occasion  as  follows:  'Lincoln  is  a  buffoon,  a  gawk; 
he  is  disgracefully  unfit  for  the  high  oiificc  to  which  he  again 
aspires.  I  departed  from  the  East  Room  with  a  sickening 
sensation  of  the  helplessness  of  our  cause.'  " 

Lamon  says: 

"Mr.  Lincoln's  habit  of  relating  vulgar  yarns  (not  one 
of  which  will  bear  printing)  was  restrained  by  no  presence 
and  no  occasion." 

General  Don  Piatt  writes  of  having  heard  Lincoln  relate 
stories  "not  one  of  which  could  appear  in  print." 

In  Vol.  4,  p.  518,  of  Rhodes'  History  of  the  United  States, 
is  this: 

"Governor  Andrew  of  Massachusetts,  in  an  interview 
with  President  Lincoln  on  a  matter  he  had  at  heart,  was  put 
off  by  Lincoln  telling  a  smutty  story,  turning  the  Govern- 
or's subject  into  ridicule.  Governor  Andrew  was  filled 
with  disgust." 

Herndon  says : 

"Lincoln's  highest  delight  was  to  get  a  rowdy  crowd  in 
groceries  (dram-shops)  or  on  street  corners  and  retail  vul- 
gar yarns  too  coarse  to  put  in  print." 

On  page  63  of  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln  we  have  this: 

"Abe  wrote  many  satires  which  are  only  remembered 
in  fragments,  but  if  we  had  them  in  full  they  were  too  inde- 
cent for  publication ;  such,  at  least,  is  the  character  of  a 
piece  touching  a  church  trial  wherein  Brother  Harper  and 
Sister  Gordon  were  parties  seeking  judgment.  It  was  very 
coarse,  but  it  served  to  raise  a  laugh  in  the  groceries  at  the 
expense  of  the  church." 

Do  the  Christian  parents  of  this  country  want  their  boys 
taught  to  imitate  a  man  who  sought  to  "raise  laughter  in  dram- 
shops at  the  expense  of  the  churches?" 

Mr.  A.  Y.  ElHs,  friend  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  says: 

"On  electioneering  trips  Mr.  Lincoln  told  stories 
which  drew  the  boys  after  him.  I  remember  them,  but  mod- 
esty forbids  me  to  repeat  them." 


yo  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     12 

Dennis  Hanks,  Lincoln's  cousin,  said: 

"Abe  had  a  great  passion  for  vulgar  yarns." 
On  p.  478,  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln,  is  this: 

"Telling  and  hearing  ridiculous  stories  was  one  of  Lin- 
coln's ruling  passions.  He  would  go  a  long  way  out  of  his 
road  to  tell  a  grave,  sedate  man  a  broad  story  or  propound 
to  him  a  conundrum  not  remarkable  for  delicacy.  If  he 
happened  to  hear  of  a  man  who  was  known  to  have  some- 
thing 'fresh'  in  this  line,  he  would  hunt  him  up  and  swap 
jokes  with  him.  This  was  so  in  Indiana,  in  New  Salem,  in 
the  Black  Hawk  war,  on  the  circuit,  on  the  stump,  every- 
where. When  court  adjourned  from  village  to  village,  the 
taverns,  the  groceries  left  behind,  were  filled  with  the  sorry 
echoes  of  'Abe's  Best.'  Men  carried  home  with  them  select 
budgets  of  his  stories,  to  be  related  to  itdhing  ears  as  'Old 
Abe's  Last* 

"His  humor  was  not  of  a  delicate  quality ;  it  was  chiefly 
exercised  in  telling  and  hearing  stories  of  the  grossest  sort. 
He  was  restrained  by  no  presence  and  no  occasion.  He 
seemed  to  make  boon  companions  of  the  coarsest  men,  of 
low,  vulgar  creatures ;  he  enjoyed  them,  extracted  from  them 
whatever  service  they  were  capable  of,  then  discarded  and 
forgot  them ;  he  used  them  as  tools  to  feed  his  desires.  If 
one  of  them,  presuming  on  the  past,  followed  him  to  Wash- 
ington, Mr.  Lincoln  would  take  him  to  his  private  office, 
lock  the  door,  revel  in  reminiscences,  new  stories  and  old, 
an  entire  evening,  and  then  dismiss  him." 

I  know  of  no  more  repulsive  characteristics  than  the  above 
portrays.  I  know  of  nothing  more  contemptible  than  for  a  man 
to  go  out  of  his  way  to  "find  fresh  indecency ;"  out  of  his  way 
to  hunt  up  and  "swap  indecency"  with  some  other  obscene  crea- 
ture. That  a  man  occupying  the  highest  office  in  America,  a 
husband  and  father,  should  find  his  chief  delight  in  hearing  and 
relating  to  "itching  ears  "  vulgar  stories ;  that  he  should  take  his 
indecent  visitors  into  a  private  room  of  the  White  House,  lock 
the  door  and  "revel  an  entire  evening  in  obscene  reminiscences 
of  old  and  new  stories,"  is  something  for  all  America  to  be 
ashamed  of.  Yet  this  foul-minded  and  foul-mouthed  man  is 
held  up  by  Republicans  as  a  model  for  American  boys  to  revere 
find  emulate.     While  writing  Lincoln's  Life,  Herndon  inquired 


Chap.   12  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  71 

of  his   cousin,   Dennis   Hanks,   what   song-s   Lincoln   most   liked 
when  he  was  a  young  man.     Dennis  replied : 

"Religious  songs  did  not  suit  him  at  all.     One  of  his 
favorite  songs  began: 

"'Hail  Columbia,  happy  land! 

If  you  ain't  drunk  I'll  be  damned.'  " 

This  song,   Mr.   Hanks  modestly    said,    "should    only    be 
warbled  in  the  fields."     Another  favorite  of  Abe's  began: 

"There  was  a  Romish  lady  brought  up  in  Popery." 

"Other  little  songs  I  won't  say  anything  about ;  they 
would  not  look  well  in  print,"  said  Mr.  Hanks. 

"Abe,"  says  Lamon,  "was  much  in  demand  in  hog-kill- 
irig  time ;  he  butchered  hogs  for  the  neighbors  around  for 
thirty-one  cents  a  day.  There  was  only  one  man  in  the 
neighborhood  whom  Abe  strongly  disliked,  and  that  was 
Joshua  Crawford.  Crawford  made  him  pay  for  a  book  he 
had  lent  him  which  Abe  had  left  where  it  was  rained  on  and 
ruined.  As  Abe  had  no  money,  Crawford  made  him  pull 
fodder  for  three  days.  This  so  angered  Lincoln  he  deter- 
mined on  revenge.  He  wrote  satires  on  Crawford's  nose, 
which  was  deformed,  being  very  big  and  bumpy  at  the  end. 
This  caused  Crawford  much  mortification,  grief  and  anguish 
of  spirit.  The  Chronicles  were  written  by  Lincoln  to  bring 
the  churches  into  ridicule.  They  were  gotten  up  in  Scrip- 
tural style.  Sister  Gordon  and  Brother  Harper,  and  Craw- 
ford's nose,  were  served  up  fresh  and  gross  for  the  amuse- 
ment of  the  grocery  boys.  A  well-to-do  man  named  Grigsby 
failed  to  invite  Lincoln  to  the  feast  and  dance  he  gave  in 
honor  of  the  marriage  of  his  two  sons.  This  made  Abe  very 
mad;  in  revenge  he  wrote  the  'Chronicle  of  Reuben.'  It 
was  very  venomous  in  spirit.  Mrs.  Crawford  attempted  to 
repeat  the  verses  in  these  Chronicles  to  Mr.  Herndon,  but 
soon  stopped,  turned  red  and  said  she  could  not;  they  were 
too  indecent.  These  verses  were  written  out  by  Mrs.  Craw- 
ford's son-in-law  and  sent  to  Herndon,  but  though  much 
curtailed  by  Mrs.  Crawford's  modesty,  it  is  still  impossible 
to  transcribe  them." 

In  "The  Story  of  a  Great  Life,"  p.  534,  Mr.  Weik  makes 
quite  an  original  comment  on  Mr.  Lincoln's  passion  for  obscenity. 


72  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     12 

"Almost  any  man,"  says  Weik,  "that  will  tell  a  vulgar 
story  has,  in  a  degree,  a  vulgar  mind.  It  was  not  so  with 
Mr.  Lincoln." 

Can  a  spring  which  continually  pours  out  muddy  water  be 
itself  clear?  Can  a  mind  which  continually  pours  out  foulness 
not  itself  be  foul?  Mr.  Weik  adds  to  his  comment  the  sage 
reflection  that  Mr.  Lincoln  had  no  ability  to  discern  or  note  the 
difference  between  the  vulgar  and  the  refined.  The  whiskey 
drinker  knows  the  difference  between  whiskey  and  water,  but 
he  craves  whiskey  and  turns  from  water  as  insipid. 

Mr.  Lincoln's  passion  for  indecent  stories  never  left  him ; 
it  was  born  with  him,  it  never  weakened,  never  died  until  it 
died  with  him  that  fatal  night  in  Ford's  Theater.  In  his  boy- 
hood it  was  eager,  curious ;  in  his  manhood  bold,  audacious.  It 
made  itself  a  factor  to  further  his  political  desires ;  it  pandered 
to  the  low,  animal  instincts  of  the  rowdy  class ;  it  fed  itself  fat 
on  their  applause.  It  traveled  with  him  on  his  electioneering 
trips  over  the  state,  drawing  crowds  of  the  base-minded  around 
him,  whose  hilarity  at  its  antics  delighted  Lincoln's  heart. 
Wherever  he  went  a  trail  of  foulness  was  left  in  his  wake ;  the 
village  taverns,  the  village  groceries  were  full  of  the  foul  odors 
from  his  soul.  He  carried  it  with  him  to  Washington  City ;  it 
entered  the  White  House,  it  abode  with  him  there  for  four  years. 
It  was  his  pet;  he  kept  it  warm  in  his  bosom,  he  fondled  it,  he 
cuddled  it.  He  carried  it  with  him  to  Cabinet  meetings ;  he  let 
it  loose  on  the  Cabinet  Alinisters,  who  roared  with  laughter  at 
its  caperings  (Chase  excepted).  A  few  days  after  the  dreadful 
battle  of  Antietam,  while  all  America,  North  and  South,  were 
mourning  over  the  slaughtered  braves,  with  //  in  his  bosom,  and 
Lamon  by  his  side,  President  Lincoln  drove  out  to  survey  the 
fatal  field.  Not  even  there  in  the  presence  of  the  sad-hearted 
commanding  General,  there  amid  so  many  fresh-made  graves, 
did  it  remain  quiescent.  Bold,  shameless,  grotesquely  gleesome, 
out  it  jumped  from  its  warm  nest  in  Lincoln's  bosom,  and  to 
the  horror  of  the  Commanding  General,  in  whose  ears  still  rever- 
berated the  cannon's  roar,  still  sounded  the  groans  and  moans 
of  the  wounded,  the  dying,  it  called  for  comic  songs,  and  Lamon, 
who  never  failed  to  dance  to  Lincoln's  piping,  sang  the  songs. 

And  this  is  the  man  American  youths  are  continually  told 
they  should  revere  and  emulate !  The  story  of  the  comic  sing- 
ing on  Antietam's  battle-field  will  be  given  in  the  next  chapter. 


Chap.  13  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  73 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

Lincoln  and  Lamon  Visit  Antietani  Battlefield.  Lincoln  Calls  for 
a  Comic  Song.  Lamon  Sings  Picayune  Butler.  General  Mc- 
Clellan  Shocked.     The  Perkins  Letter.     Mr.  Lincoln's  Reply. 

In  1862  a  damaging-  story  appeared  in  the  newspapers  which 
caused  much  talk.  From  that  time  until  Lincoln's  death,  in 
1865,  newspapers  continued  to  relate  the  story,  and  to  challenge 
denial,  but  denial  was  never  made  until  long  after  Mr.  Lincoln's 
death.  The  Sussex  (N.  J.)  Statesman  told  the  story  in  1862, 
as  follows : 

"Lincoln  on  the  Battlefield." 

"We  see  that  n]any  papers  are  referring  to  the  fact 
that  Lincoln  ordered  a  comic  song  to  be  sung  upon  the  bat- 
tlefield. We  have  known  the  facts  of  the  transaction  for 
some  time,  but  have  refrained  from  speaking  about  them. 
As  the  newspapers  are  stating  some  of  the  facts,  we  will 
give  the  whole.  Soon  after  one  of  the  most  desperate  and 
sanguinary  battles,  Mr.  Lincoln  visited  the  Commanding 
General,  who,  with  his  staff,  took  him  over  the  field,  and 
explained  to  him  the  plan  of  the  battle,  and  the  particular 
places  where  the  battle  was  most  fierce.  At  one  point  the 
Commanding  General  said :  'Here  on  this  side  of  the  road 
five  hundred  of  our  brave  fellows  were  killed,  and  just  on 
the  other  side  of  the  road  four  hundred  and  fifty  more  were 
killed,  and  right  on  the  other  side  of  that  wall  five  hundred 
rebels  were  destroyed.  We  have  buried  them  where  they 
fell.'  •'!  declare,'  said  the  President,  'this  is  getting  gloomy ; 
let  us  drive  away.'  After  driving  a  few  rods  the  President 
said :  ']2ick,'  speaking  to  his  companion,  'can't  you  give  us 
something  to  cheer  us  up?  Give  us  a  song,  a  lively  one.' 
Wliereupon,  Jack  struck  up,  as  loud  as  he  could  bawl,  a 
comic  negro  song,  which  he  continued  to  sing  while  thev 
were  riding  off  from  the  battle  ground,  and  until  they  ap- 
proached a  regiment  drawn  up,  when  the  Commanding  Gen- 
eral said :  'Would  it  not  be  well  for  your  friend  to  cease 
his  song  till  we  pass  this  regiment?  The  poor  fellows  have 
lost  more  than  half  their  number.  They  are  feeling  very 
badly,  and  I  should  be  afraid  of  the  effect  it  would  have 
on  them.'  The  President  asked  his  friend  to  stop  singing 
until  they  passed  the  regiment. 


74  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     13 

"When  this  story  was  told  to  us  we  said :  'It  is  incred- 
ible, it  is  impossible,  that  any  man  could  act  so  over  the 
fresh-made  graves  of  the  heroic  dead.'  But  the  story  is 
told  on  such  authority  we  know  it  to  be  true.  We  tell  the 
story  now  that  the  people  may  have  some  idea  of  the  man 
elected  to  be  President  of  the  United  States." 

The  Statesman's  story  is  rather  guarded.  It  does  not  give 
the  name  of  the  battlefield,  of  the  Commanding  General,  or  of 
the  personal  friend  with  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  sang  the  comic  song. 
Other  papers  made  no  reservation.  Lamon  was  the  friend  who 
sang  the  song.  General  McClellan  was  the  Commanding  officer. 
Antietam  the  battlefield.  Lamon  wrote  "The  Life  of  Lincoln" 
in  1872,  but  makes  no  reference  to  this  story.  In  Lamon's  pa- 
pers, published  by  his  daughter,  1895,  the  story  is  told  thus: 

"The  story,"  said  Lamon,  "was  blown  about  into  a  re- 
volting and  deplorable  scandal  on  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  was 
painted  as  the  prime  mover  in  a  scene  of  fiendish  levity 
more  atrocious  than  the  world  has  ever  witnessed." 

Lamon  further  states  that  he  and  Mr.  Lincoln  both  smarted 
under  the  defamation;  that  he  (Lamon)  was  anxious  to  silence 
it  by  denial,  but  Lincoln  would  not  permit  him  to  make  a  denial. 

Lincoln  said  to  Lamon : 

"Let  the  thing  alone.  In  politics  every  man  must  skin 
his  own  skunk.  These  fellows  are  welcome  to  the  hide  of 
this  one.    Its  body  has  already  given  out  its  unsavory  odor." 

General  Piatt  refers  to  the  comic  song  story  in  his  book, 
published  in  1887,  as  if  it  were  true,  and  believed  to  be  true  by 
the  public.  In  1895,  after  all  the  parties  concerned  were  dead, 
Lamon's  daughter,  Dorothy,  published  a  book  she  called  "La- 
mon's Recollections  of  Lincoln,'^  in  which  is  given  the  following 
account,  taken  from  Mr.  Lamon's  papers : 

"The  newspapers,"  said  Lamon,  "and  the  stump  speak- 
ers went  on  stuffing  the  ears  of  men  with  reports  of  w.hat 
was  known  as  the  'Antietam  Song-Singing'  until  the  fall 
of  1864,  when  I  showed  to  Mr.  Lincoln  a  letter,  of  which 
the  following  is  a  copy.  It  is  a  fair  example  of  hundreds 
of  letters  received  about  that  time.  The  Antietam  incident 
was  then  being  discussed  with  increased  virulence." 

The  following  is  Mr.  Perkins'  letter  to  Mr.  Lamon: 


Chap.  13  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  75 

"Philadelphia,    September    10. 
"Ward  H.  Lamon: 

"Dear  Sir — Enclosed  is  an  extract  from  the  New  York 
World  of  September  9th,  1864.  entitled,  'One  of  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's Jokes.' 

"  'A  few  days  after  the  battle  of  Antietam,  while  Presi- 
dent Lincoln  was  driving  over  the  field  in  an  ambulance, 
accompanied  by  Marshal  Lamon,  General  McClellan  and  an- 
other officer,  heavy  details  of  men  were  engaged  in  the 
task  of  burying  the  dead.  The  ambulance  had  just  reached 
the  neighborhood  of  the  old  stone  bridge,  where  the  dead 
were  piled  highest,  when  Mr.  Lincoln,  suddenly  slapping 
Marshal  Lamon  on  the  knee,  exclaimed :  'Come,  Lamon ! 
Give  us  that  song  about  Picayune  Butler ;  McClellan  has 
never  heard  it'  'Not  now,  if  you  please,'  said  McClellan. 
with  a  shudder.  'I  would  prefer  hearing  it  at  some  other 
place  and  time.' 

"This  story  had  been  repeated  in  the  New  York  World 
almost  daily  for  the  last  three  months.  Lentil  now  it  would 
have  been  useless  to  demand  the  authority.  Now  we  have 
Marshal  Lamon,  General  McClellan  and  another  officer. 
The  story  is  damaging  to  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  is  believed  by 
many,  as  is  very  evident  from  the  doggerel  verses  accom- 
panying the  story,  of  which  the  following  is  a  sample: 

"  'Abe  may  crack  his  jolly  jokes 

Over  bloody  fields  of  battle, 
While  yet  the  ebbing  life  tide  smokes  ■  ^'' •  .      ! 

From  men  who  die  like  butchered  cattle,  ^^^  i 

And  even  before  the  guns  grow  cold 

To  pimps  and  pets  Abe  cracks  his  jokes.' 

"I  wish  to  ask  you,  sir,  in  behalf  of  others,  as  well  as 
myself,  whether  any  such  occurrence  took  place?  If  it  did 
not  take  place,  please  state  who  that  other  ofificer  was,  if 
there  was  any  such  in  the  ambulance  in  which  President 
Lincoln  was  driving  over  the  field  of  Antietam.  while  de- 
tails of  men  were  engaged  in  the  task  of  burying  the  dead. 
You  will  confer  a  great  favor  by  an  immediate  reply. 
"INTost  respectfully,  your  obedient  servant, 

"A.  J.  Perkins." 
Lamon  states  that  he  submitted  the  Perkins  letter  to  Mr. 
Lincoln,  and  with  it  his  own  draft  of  a  reply  to  Perkins.     Lin- 
coln read  them  both  carefully,  shook  his  head,  z^nd  said: 


j6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     13 

"No,  Lamon  ;  your  reply  won't  do.  Let  me  try  my  hand 
at  it." 

"Then,"  continues  Lamon,  "Mr.  Lincoln  sat  down  and 
wrote  slowly,  and  with  great  deliberation  and  care,  a  letter, 
to  be  copied  by  me  and  sent  to  Mr.  Perkins  as  my  letter." 

If  the  comic  song  story  was  false,  why  was  it  not  tersely 
and  shortly  denied?  Why  did  the  Perkins  letter  require  Mr. 
Lincoln  to  write  that  denial  with  "great  deliberation,  slowly  and 
carefully?"  Mr.  Lamon's  daughter  gives  the  whole  of  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's letter  to  Mr.  Perkins,  which  he  wrote  in  the  name  of 
Lamon. 

"The  President,"  wrote  Mr.  Lincoln,  "has  known  me 
intimately  for  nearly  twenty  years,  and  has  often  heard  me 
singing  little  ditties." 

Was  this  relevant?  Was  this  even  akin  to  denial?  The 
letter  then  proceeds  to  give  a  minute  account  of  their  departure 
from  Washington  City,  of  meeting  General  McClellan  coming 
from  his  headquarters  near  the  battle  ground,  of  reviewing  the 
troops  at  Bolivar  Heights,  in  company  with  McClellan,  in  the 
afternoon,  of  going  with  General  Sumner  next  morning  and  re- 
viewing the  troops  at  Loudon  Heights,  of  reviewing  the  troops 
at  Maryland  Heights,  then  at  noon  starting  off  to  General  Mc- 
Clellan's  headquarters,  of  getting  there  only  a  little  time  before 
night,  of  next  morning  starting  off  to  review  Antietarn  battle- 
field. Was  this  minute  detail  of  Lincoln  and  Lamon's  move- 
ments during  the  two  days  previous  to  the  comic  song  episode 
in  the  least  necessary  ?  Was  it  in  the  least  pertinent  to  a  denial  ? 
If  Mr.  Lincoln  had  an  honest  denial  to  make,  would  he  not  have 
made  it  in  a  dozen  or  a  half  dozen  words  ?  "The  story  is  false" 
(if  it  were  false),  wOuld  naturally  have  been  the  way  to  deny  it. 
But  even  after  arriving  at  Antietam,  Lincoln  made  no  direct  de- 
nial.    He  continued  to  whip  the  devil  around  the  stump. 

After  getting  through  with  General  Burnsides'  corps." 
wrote  President  Lincoln  for  Mr.  Lamon,  "at  the  suggestion 
of  General  McClellan,  he  and  the  President  left  their  horses 
to  be  led  and  went  into  an  ambulance  or  ambulances  to  go 
to  General  Fitz  Porter's  corps.  I  am  not  certain  whether 
the  President  and  General  McClellan  were  in  the  same  am- 
bulance or  in  different  ones,  but  myself  (Lamon)  and  some 
others  were  in  the  same  with  the  President.  On  the  way.  in 
no  part  of  the  battle  ground,  and  on  whose  suggestion  I  do 


Chap.   13  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  77 

not  remember,  the  President  asked  me  to  sing  the  little  sad 
song  he  had  often  heard  me  sing.  After  it  was  over  some 
one  of  the  party,  I  do  not  think  it  was  the  President,  asked 
me  to  sing  something  else.  I  sang  two  or  three  little  comic 
songs,  of  which  Picayune  Bntler  was  one." 

Is  this  a  denial?  Can  any  one  believe  that  General  McClel- 
lan  or  the  officer  with  him  in  the  Lincoln  ambulance  called  for 
a  comic  song?  Lamon  had  so  long  been  in  the  habit  of  catering 
to  the  President's  humor  for  comic  songs,  neither  he  nor  Lincoln 
could  realize  how  such  songs  would  afifect  others,  especially  how 
they  would  harrow  the  feelings  of  army  officers  just  through 
the  awful  ordeal  of  a  bloody  battle.  Even  after  this  attempted 
denial  Mr.  Lincoln  continued  his  minute  descriptions  of  what 
he  and  Lamon  did. 

"The  battle  ground  was  passed,"  wrote  Lincoln,  "the 
most  noted  parts  examined." 

Then  Mr.  Lincoln  gives  a  detailed  account  of  what  he, 
Lamon  and  General  McClellan  did  the  day  after  the  comic  song- 
singing  incident.  Was  this  to  confuse  the  reader's  mind,  to  di- 
vert attention  from  the  main  point,  which  was  denial  of  comic 
song-singing?  The  conclusion  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  letter  is  pe- 
culiar. 

"Neither  McClellan  nor  any  one  else,"  he  wrote,  "made 
any  objections  to  the  singing.  The  place  was  not  on  the 
battlefield,  the  time  was  sixteen  days  after  the  battle.  No 
dead  bodies  were  seen,  nor  even  a  grave  that  had  not  been 
rained  on  since  it  had  been  made." 

Was  it  likely  that  any  army  officer  would  run  the  risk  of 
offending  the  President,  who  had  the  power  of  promoting  or 
pulling  down  officers?  Yet,  though  slowly  and  carefully  as  Mr. 
Lincoln  had  written  the  letter  intended  to  be  sent  to  Mr.  Per- 
kins, it  was  never  sent.  Why  ?  Was  it  because  Lincoln,  shrewd 
lawyer  that  he  was,  saw  his  so-called  denial  would  not  hold 
water  ? 

Lamon  says  Mr.  Lincoln,  not  satisfied  with  his  own  attempt 
at  denial,  gave  the  letter  to  him  to  lay  away  for  future  use,  but 
forbade  any  denial  at  that  time.  Was  this  because  the  two  offi- 
cers who  were  in  the  ambulance  with  Lincoln  were  still  living 
and  could  have  contradicted  misstatements?  No  denial  was 
made  during  the  lifetime  of  any  of  the  parties  concerned.  No 
denial  was  made  until   1895,  when  Miss  Dorothy  Lamon  pub- 


78  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     14 

lished  the  story  from  her  deceased  father's  papers.  After  having 
related  the  comic  song  story,  Lamon's  next  page  descants  on  Mr. 
Lincoln's  extreme  fondness  for  negro  comic  songs,  "Picayune 
Butler"  being  his  prime  favorite.  "The  Blue-Tailed  Fly"  was 
a  great  favorite.  "A  comic  song,"  says  Mr.  Lamon,  "sung  at  a 
theater,  always  restored  Mr.  Lincoln  to  cheerful  humor."  To 
sing  these  songs  seems  to  have  been  part  of  Lamon's  duty  to 
the  President.  Had  Lincoln  been  a  King,  and  had  he  and  La- 
mon lived  in  ancient  times,  Lamon  would  have  held  the  position 
of  the  King's  Jester. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

The  True  and  the  False.  Apotheosidng  Writers.  Miss  Tarbell 
Takes  the  Lead.  Why  Thomas  Lincoln  Left  Kentucky. 
Apotheosizing  Twaddle.     Mr.  Lincoln  and  Tzi'o  Little  Girls. 

It  is  curious  to  compare  some  of  what  Lamon  called  the 
"pretended  biographies"  of  Lincoln  with  the  true  story  told  by 
men  who  knew  Lincoln  and  painted  him  just  as  he  was  in  life, 
faults  and  all.  In  the  smallest  thing  the  "pretended  biographies" 
misrepresent  and  misstate.  Instance  the  following  from  Miss 
Tarbell's  "Life  of  Lincoln:" 

"If  Mr.  Lincoln  was  not  strictly  orthodox,  he  was  pro- 
foundly religious.  He  was  a  regular  and  reverent  attend- 
ant at  church." 

And  this: 

"Lincoln  never  for  a  moment  courted  personal  ambition 
before  the  cause  of  negro  freedom," 

Lincoln's  own  words  convict  him  of  utter  indifference  to 
the  cause  of  negro  freedom. 

This  from  Tarbell  (p.  220,  Vol.  i)  : 

''So  great  an  evil  did  Thomas  Lincoln  and  Nancy  Hanks 
Lincoln  (Lincoln's  parents)  hold  slavery,  to  escape  it  they 
left  their  home  in  Kentucky  and  moved  to  a  free  state. 
Thus  their  boy  Abe's  first  notion  of  slavery  was  that  it  was 
some  dreadful  thing  to  flee  from,  a  thing  so  dreadful  that  it 
was  one's  duty  to  go  to  pain  and  hardship  to  escape  it." 

Holland  and  other  apotheosizing  biographers  tell  about  the 
same  story  on  this  subject.    The  falsity  of  this  is  proved  by  Hern- 


Chap.   14  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


79 


don,  Lamon  and  Mr.  Dennis  Hanks,  Lincoln's"  cousin.     Lamon 
refutes  the  story  thus: 

"It  has  pleased  some  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  biographers  to 
represent  that  Lincoln's  father's  move  from  Kentucky  was 
a  flight  from  the  taint  of  slavery.  Nothing  could  be  farther 
from  the  truth.  There  was  not  at  that  time  more  than  fifty 
negroes  in  all  Harden  County,  which  then  composed  a  vast 
area  of  territory.  It  was  practically  a  free  community. 
There  is  not  the  slightest  evidence  that  Lincoln's  father  ever 
disclosed  any  conscientious  scruples  concerning  slaverv. 
Abraham  Lincoln's  father  got  into  trouble  with  a  man  named 
Enslow.  They  fought  like  savages.  Lincoln  bit  off  Ens- 
low's  nose.  This  affray  and  the  talk  it  made  was  the  cause 
of  Thomas  Lincoln's  escape   from   Kentucky." 

(See  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln,  p.  916.) 

Lies  are  hard  to  kill.  Notwithstanding  the  most  positive 
evidence  on  this  subject,  the  pretended  biographers  continue  to 
tell  falsehoods  about  Lincoln's  hatred  of  slavery  and  his  great 
piety. 

Although  General  Piatt  at  first  opposed  the  deification  of 
President  Lincoln,  and  disliked  the  "pious  lies,"  still  as  the  years 
went  by  and  the  "pious  lies"  continued  with  an  ever-increasing 
"piety,"  they  got  in  their  work  on  Piatt's  mind,  despite  his  per- 
sonal knowledge  of  how  little  they  comported  with  the  dead 
President's  character.     In  1887  Piatt  wrote  as  follows: 

"It  is  strange  now  to  know  that  during  President  Lin- 
coln's life,  and  for  years  after  his  death,  he  was  popularly 
regarded  as  a  shrewd,  cunning  sort  of  man." 

There  was  nothing  strange  in  it.  Lincoln  was  a  shrewd, 
cunning  sort  of  man,  and  the  people  knew  it. 

During  Lincoln's  life,  and  for  years  after  his  death,  Piatt 
well  knew  that  Lincoln  was  a  "shrewd,  cunning  sort  of  man." 
Every  one  who  well  knew  Lincoln  knew  that  Seward  had  judged 
correctly  when  he  said  Lincoln  had  a  cunning  which  was  genius. 
It  was  admitted  by  his  friends  that  he  was  the  shrewdest  poli- 
tician of  his  age.  "But,"  continues  Piatt,  "the  public  mind  will 
slowly  come  to  dwell  entranced  on  that  grand  central  figure — 
Abraham  Lincoln." 

Entranced f  Yes :  not  with  the  real  Lincoln,  but  with  the 
deified  man  the  public  is  taught  to  think  was  the  Lincoln  of 
the  6o's.  Piatt  himself  had  drawn  Lincoln's  pen  portrait  before 
the  deified  theorv  had  entranced  his  faculties. 


8o  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     14 

"I  saw,"  said  Piatt,  "a  man  of  coarse,  rough  fibre,  with- 
out culture.  His  views  of  human  nature  were  low,  but  good- 
natured.  This  low  estimate  of  humanity  blinded  him  to  the 
South.  He  could  not  believe  that  men  would  fight  for  an 
idea.  Lincoln  considered  the  Southern  movement  a  game 
of  political  bluff.  'The  men  of  the  South,'  he  said,  'won't 
give  up  the  offices.  Were  it  believed  that  vacant  places 
could  be  had  at  the  North  Pole,  the  road  there  would  be 
lined  with  dead  Virginians.'  " 

Had  this  man  been  born  of  the  blood  and  blackness  of  the 
Hottentot  race,  had  he  grown  up  in  the  jungles  of  Africa,  he 
could  not  have  known  less  of  the  nature  of  Virginia's  sons.  Did 
he  ever  come  to  see  his  mistake?  Did  he  ever  come  to  realize 
how  men  will  fight  for  the  idea  of  independence?  When  Robert 
E.  Lee  refused  to  accept  high  rank  in  the  Union  Army  because 
he  would  not,  could  not,  fight  his  own  people,  but  was  willing 
to  fight  and  die  in  their  defense,  did  Mr.  Lincoln  realize  that  at 
least  one  Virginian  valued  ideas  and  principles  more  than  office? 
In  Herndon's  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln  we  are  told  that  from 
early  youth  Lincoln's  whole  and  sole  ambition  was  to  gain  office. 
Politics  was  Lincoln's  trade,  office  his  aim.  Did  Lincoln  look 
into  his  own  soul  and  measure  Virginians  thereby? 

On  p.  237  of  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln  is  this : 

"Mr.  Lincoln  was  never  agitated  by  any  passion  more 
intense  than  his  wonderful  thirst  for  distinction  ;  distinction 
was  the  feverish  dream  of  his  youth.  Thirst  for  distinction 
governed  all  his  conduct  up  to  the  day  the  assassin  ended 
his  life.     Mr.  Lincoln  struggled  incessantly  for  place." 

In  Weik's  Story  of  a  Great  Life  he  says : 

"Mr.  Lincoln's  restless  ambition  found  its  gratification 
only  in  the  field  of  politics." 

Piatt  gives  a  pen  portrait  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  face  and  form: 

"Mr.  Lincoln,"  says  Piatt,  "was  the  homeliest  man  I 
ever  saw.  His  body  seemed  one  huge  skeleton  in  clothes. 
Tall  as  he  was  (six  feet  four  inches),  his  hands  and  feet 
looked  out  of  proportion,  so  long  and  clumsy  were  they. 
Every  movement  was  awkward  in  the  extreme.  He  had  a 
face  which  defied  the  artist's  skill  to  soften  or  idealize.  It 
was  capable  of  but  few  expressions.  When  in  repose  his 
face  was  dull  and  repellant.  It  brightened  like  a  lit  lantern 
when  animated.     I  discovered  that  he  was  a  skeptic." 


Chap,  14  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  81 

Being  a  zealous  abolitionist,  Piatt  sounded  Mr.  Lincoln  on 
the  question  of  slavery.     Piatt  says: 

"I  soon  discovered  that  Mr.  Lincoln  could  no  more  feel 
sympathy  for  the  wretched  slaves  than  he  could  for  the 
horse  he  worked  or  the  hog  he  killed."  "Descended,"  con- 
tinued Piatt,  trying  to  explain  Mr.  Lincoln's  want  of  feeling 
for  negroes,  "from  the  poor  whites  of  the  South,  he  inherited 
the  contempt,  if  not  the  hatred,  held  by  that  class  for  the 
negro  race.  It  is  the  popular  belief  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  of 
so  kind  a  nature  his  generous  impulse  often  interfered  with 
his  duty.  To  prove  this,  attention  is  called  to  the  fact  that 
he  never  permitted  a  man  to  be  shot  for  desertion  or  sleep- 
ing at  his  post.  This  belief  is  erroneous.  I  doubt  whether 
Mr.  Lincoln  had  at  all  a  kind,  forgiving  nature.  There 
was  far  more  policy  than  kind  feeling  which  made  him  refuse 
to  sanction  the  death  penalty  for  desertion.  It  pleased  Mr. 
Lincoln  to  be  the  source  of  mercy  as  well  as  the  fountain  of 
honor." 

Piatt's  study  of  Lincoln's  character  led  him  to  believe  he 
was  incapable  of  feeling  pity  for  the  suffering  of  others.  Piatt 
also  believed  that  God  had  created  Lincoln  callous  of  feeling  to 
save  him  (Lincoln)  from  the  pain  of  pity  on  witnessing  the  sol- 
diers' sufiferings.  Lincoln  told  General  Schenck  that  the  suffer- 
ings he  witnessed  never  interfered  with  his  comfort.  "I  eat  my 
rations  three  times  a  day,"  said  Lincoln,  "and  sleep  the  sleep 
of  the  innocent."    And  this  despite  the  horrors  around  him. 

In  her  life  of  Lincoln,  Miss  Tarbell  describes  the  sights  of 
Washington  City,  which  Mr.  Lincoln  could  not  avoid  looking 
upon. 

"After  battles,"  says  Miss  Tarbell,  "for  days  and  days 
long,  straggling  trains  of  mutilated  men  poured  into  the  city 
on  flat  cars,  piled  so  close  together  that  no  attendant  could 
pass  between  the  wounded  men.  Occasionally  these  wretched 
men  were  protected  from  the  cold  by  blankets,  which  had 
escaped  with  its  owner,  or  from  the  sun  by  boughs  put  in 
their  hands,  to  be  held  over  their  faces  on  reaching  Wash- 
ington. These  suffering  men  were  laid  in  long  rows  on  the 
wharf  or  platform  v.-aiting  until  the  ambulance  carried  them 
to  hospitals.  When  one  considers  the  wounded  in  the 
great  Virginia  battles  he  will  realize  the  length  and  awful- 
ness  of  the  streams  of  bleeding,  suffering  men  which  flowed 
into  Washington  City.     At  Fredericksburg  they  numbered 


82  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.   14 

9,600,  at  Chancellorsville  9,762,  in  the  Wilderness   12,070, 
at    Spottsylvania    13,406.     After   the    battle    of    Bull    Run,  . 
churches,  dwellings  and  g-overnment  buildings  were  seized 
to  put  the  wounded  in.     The  hospitals  could  not  begin  to 
hold  them. 

"By  the  end  of  1862  Mr.  Lincoln  could  hardly  walk  or 
drive  in  his  carriage  in  any  direction  without  passing  a  hos- 
pital full  of  the  maimed,  the  dying.     Even  in  going  to  his 
summer    cottage    he    could    not    escape    the    sight    of    the 
wounded.     The  hillsides  were  dotted  with  tents  during  the 
entire  war.     Tents  were  close  to  the  roadside,  so  as  to  get 
more   fresh  air.      Mr.   Lincoln   frequently  looked   from   his 
carriage  window  on  the  very  beds  of  the  wounded  soldiers." 
"The  very  beds."     What  does  this  mean,  if  not  that  Miss 
Tarbell's  pity  goes  out  not  to  the  poor,  mutilated,  wounded,  dy- 
ing men  in  the  tents,  but  to  the  high  functionary  who — 

"Could  hardly  walk  or  drive  in  his  carriage  in  any 
direction  without  seeing  suffering  soldiers?" 

"When  Mr.  Lincoln/'  continues  Miss  Tarbell,  "visited 
these  wretched  sufferers,  he  freely  shook  hands  with  them, 
for  which  they  were  profoundly  grateful." 

"Freely?"     And  why  "profoundly  grateful?"     If  gratitude 
was  due  from  one  side  or  the  other,  surely  these  maimed  and 
bleeding  men  should  have  received  it  from  the  President  who 
invited,  or  forced,  them  into  the  ranks  to  fight.     They  suffered 
while  obeying  his  command. 

Miss  Tarbell  puts  on  record  other  equally  important  acts  of 
Mr.  Lincoln.     Instance  the  following: 

"On  one  occasion  two  little  girls,  shabbily  dressed, 
strayed  into  the  White  House.  While  gazing  about,  scared. 
President  Lincoln  happened  to  see  them,  and  said:  'Little 
girls,  are  you  going  to  pass  me  without  shaking  hands?' 
Then  he  shook  each  child  by  the  hand.  Everybody  was 
spellbound." 

Can  any  man  or  woman  in  America  see  any  good  reason 
why  "everybody"  or  anybody  should  be  spellbound  because  an 
American  President  shook  two  little  girls  by  the  hand?  Does 
Miss  Tarbell  look  on  all  American  Presidents  as  so  high  above 
common  mortals  that  common  mortals  are  "profoundly  grate- 
ful" for  a  shake  of  their  hands,  whether  "freely"  made  or  other- 
wise? Does  Miss  Tarbell  feel  this  way  about  every  President, 
or  is  the  above  only  the  usual  apotliensis  twaddle  Republican 
writers  indulge  in  about  Mr.  Lincoln? 


Chap.  14  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  83 

On  the  wall  of  one  of  the  splendid  art  galleries  in  the  pal- 
ace of  Versailles  hangs  a  large  painting  representing  a  street 
scene  in  Paris.  The  central  figure  is  a  portrait  of  a  Bourbon 
King.  He  stands  amid  a  group  of  little  beggar  children,  one 
royal  hand  on  the  top  of  a  little  beggar  girl's  head ;  the  other  is 
scattering  coins  among  the  children.  In  the  background  stands 
the  King's  attendants.  If  anybody  was  "spellbound"  because  a 
King  patted  the  head  of  a  little  beggar  girl  on  the  street,  no 
French  historian  has  recorded  the  fact. 

In  the  study  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  character  I  find  traits  which 
no  biographer  has  seemed  to  see.  When  Lincoln  was  only  one 
of  the  common  people,  only  a  plain,  poor  man,  his  speeches  and 
letters  indicate  a  liberty-loving  nature.  After  he  became  what 
his  worshippers  fondly  term  a  "great  ruler,"  his  every  act  and 
some  of  his  writings  betray  the  spirit  of  autocracy  as  strong 
as  any  Caesar  ever  felt.  A  few  instances  will  illustrate.  In  1854, 
i6th  of  October,  in  a  speech  delivered  in  Peoria.  Illinois,  Lincoln 
said:  "No  man  is  good  enough  to  govern  any  other  man  with- 
out his  consent."  This  is  good  Democratic  doctrine.  On  hear- 
ing these  words  fall  from  Lincoln's  lips  in  1854,  who  would 
have  thought  it  possible  that  within  six  short  years  from  that 
time  Lincoln  would  make  himself  the  absolute  master,  not  of  one 
man  alone,  but  of  millions?  In  1859  Lincoln  still  seemed  to 
think  and  feel  as  a  liberty-loving  man.  In  that  year  a  Boston 
committee  invited  Mr.  Lincoln  to  speak  at  the  celebration  of  , 
Thomas  Jefferson's  birthday.  Unable  to  accept,  Lincoln  wrote 
to  the  committee  as  follows : 

"It  is  no  child's  play  to  save  the  principles  of  Jefferson 
from  overthrow  in  this  Nation.  Some  call  these  principles 
'dashing  generalities,'  others  'self-evident  lies ;'  expressions 
which  tend  to  the  supplanting  of  the  principles  of  freedom. 
All  honor  to  Jefferson,  to  the  man  who,  in  the  concrete 
pressure  of  a  struggle  for  independence,  had'  the  courage  to 
forecast  and  the  capacity  to  introduce  into  a  merely  revo- 
lutionary document,  an  abstract  truth  applicable  to  all  men 
all  times,  and  so  embalm  it  that  in  all  coming  days  it  shall 
be  a  stumbling  block  to  the  harbingers  of  a  reappearing  ty- 
ranny and  oppression.  Abraham  Lincoln." 

This  has  the  true  ring  of  freedom.  Alas !  Alas !  How 
soon  did  Lincoln  lose  sight  of  Jefferson's  grand  truths?  How 
soon  did  he  trample  them  out  of  sight  deep  down  in  the  bloody 
mire  of  a  hundred  battlefields.     I  beg  the  reader  to  hold  the 


84  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     14 

above  letter  in  mind,  that  he  may  compare  it  with  one  Mr.  Lin- 
coln wrote  four  years  later  (1863),  after  he  had  made  himself 
the  absolute  master  of  all  the  millions  in  the  Northern  States, 
and  was  hard  at  work  to  subjugate  the  millions  in  the  South. 
Had  the  one  letter  been  written  by  Thomas  Jefferson  himself, 
and  the  other  by  the  Czar  of  Russia  or  the  Sultan  of  Turkey,  the 
spirit,  the  tone,  the  words,  the  meaning  of  the  two  could  be  no 
more  widely  opposed.  The  one  is  as  Democratic  as  the  other 
is  despotic.  {See  letter,  second  part,  in  reply  to  com- 
mittee requesting  the  liberation  of  Vallandingham.) 

In  a  speech  at  Springfield,  Illinois,  June  26th,  1857,  Lin- 
coln quoted  liberally  from  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and 
laid  great  emphasis   on  the  immortal   words: 

"Governments  derive  their  just  powers  from  the  con- 
sent of  the  governed."  "The  author  of  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  meant  it  to  be  as,  thank  God  I  it  is  now  prov- 
ing itself  to  be,  a  stumbling  block  to  all  those  who  in  after 
times  might  seek  to  turn  a  free  people  back  to  the  hateful 
paths  of  despotism.  They  know  the  proneness  of  prosperity 
to  breed  tyrants,  and  they  meant,  when  such  should  appear  in 
this  fair  land,  for  them  at  least  to  find  one  hard  nut  to 
crack." 

Lincoln  never  attempted  to  crack  that  nut ;  he  simply  ignored 
it  until  he  was  Commander-in-Chief  of  over  2,000,000  arnied 
men  and  felt  himself  the  absolute  ruler  of  the  unarmed  millions 
of  the  North ;  then  he  boldly  kicked  that  nut  out  of  his  way,  and 
turned  a  free  people  back  to  the  hateful  paths  of  despotism. 
Those  who  believe  in  the  possibilities  of  human  foresight  may 
easily  fancy  Mr.  Lincoln  at  times  possessed  that  occult  power. 

In  1837,  when  Lincoln  was  28  years  old,  he  delivered  a  lect- 
ure in  Springfield  which  seemed  to  foreshadow  the  part  he  him- 
self was  destined  to  play  in  the  awful  drama  of  the  6o's.  The 
title  of  this  lecture  was  "The  Perpetuation  of  Our  Free  Institu- 
tions." Lincoln  began  by  talking  of  the  danger  that  was  ap- 
proaching the  people  of  this  country  and  the  direction  whence 
it  would  come. 

"At  what  point,"  he  asked,  "shall  we  expect  the  ap- 
proach of  this  danger  ?  Shall  we  expect  some  trans- Atlantic 
military  giant  to  step  across  the  ocean  and  crush  us  at  a 
blow?  Never!  All  the  armies  of  Europe,  Asia  and  Africa, 
combined,  with  a  Bonaparte  for  a  commander,  could  not  by 
force  take  a  drink  from  the  Ohio    or  make  a  track  on  the 


Chap.   15  1\\c:ts  and  Falsehoods.  85 

Blue  Ridge,  In  a  tliousand  years.  The  danger  will  not  come 
from  abroad.  If  destruction  be  our  lot.  we  ourselves  must 
be  its  author  and  its  finisher.  As  a  nation  of  free  men,  we 
must  live  through  all  time,  or  die  by  suicide." 

Lincoln  then  expressed  the  belief  that  the  danger  would 
come  from  the  demoralization  of  the  American  people. 

"That,"  he  cried,  "will  be  the  time  when  the  usurper 
will  put  down  his  heel  on  the  neck  of  the  people,  and  batter 
down  the  fair  fabric  of  free  institutions.  Manv  great  and 
good  men  may  be  found  whose  ambition  aspires  no  higher 
than  a  seat  in  Congress,  or  a  Presidential  chair,  but  srcb.  Ix-- 
long  not  to  the  family  of  the  Lion,  or  the  tribe  of  the  Eagle. 
What!  Think  you  such  places  would  satisfy  an  Alexander? 
a  C?esar?  or  a  Napoleon?  Never!  Towering  ambition  dis- 
dains a  beaten  path.  It  seeks  regions  unexplored.  It  sees 
no  grandeur  in  adding  story  to  story  upon  the  monuments 
already  erected  to  the  memory  of  others.  It  scorns  to  tread 
in  the  footsteps  of  any  predecessor,  however  illustrious.  It 
thirsts,  it  burns,  for  distinction,  and,  if  possible,  it  will  have 
it,  whether  at  the  expense  of  emancipating  slaves  or  enslav- 
ing free  men." 

When  we  remember  Herndon's  and  Lamon's  testimony  that 
Lincoln's  "thirst  for  distinction"  was  the  master  passion  of  his 
life,  that  his  youth  and  manhood  were  spent  in  the  restless  and 
eager  pursuit  of  office,  of  power,  of  place,  the  above  words  pos- 
sess a  strange,  if  not  prophetic,  significance.  Did  Lincoln  feel  or 
fancy  himself  of  the  Lion  family?  Or  of  the  Eagle  tribe?  Did 
his  "towering  ambition"  disdain  to  walk  in  the  path  trodden  by 
the  feet  of  preceding  Presidents?  Did  he  see  no  distinction  in 
adding  "story  on  story  upon  a  monument  already  erected  to  oth- 
ers?" Did  he  "scorn  to  walk  in  the  footsteps  of  any  predecessor?" 
Was  it  "burning  thirst  for  distinction  above  all  other  American 
Presidents"  which  made  Lincoln  "rush  on  carnage,"  enslave 
5.000,000  of  his  own  race,  color  and  blood,  and  set  free  4,000,000 
of  an  alien  race,  a  diflferent  color,  blood  and  kin? 


CHAPTER  XV. 

A  Brief  Account  of  the  Tzvo  Policies,  President  Johnson's  and 
That  of  the  Republican  Leaders. 

Soon  after  Johnson  assumed  the  Presidency  he  sent  General 
Grant,   December    13,    1865,  to  make  a  trip  over  the   Southern 


86  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     15 

States  to  observe  and  report  the  state  of  the  country,  and  es- 
pecially the  temper  of  the  people.  Were  they  disposed  to  keep 
the  peace?  Were  there  any  signs  of  rebellion?  Would  they 
quietly  return  to  the  peaceful  vocations  of  life?  Grant  made  the 
following  report  to  the  President: 

"My  observations  lead  me  to  believe  that  the  citizens 
of  the  Southern  States  are  anxious  to  return  to  self-govern- 
ment within  the  Union  as  soon  as  possible.  They  are  in  earn- 
est in  wishing  to  do  what  is  required  of  them  by  the  Gov- 
ernment, not  humiliating  as  citizens,  and  will  pursue  such 
a  course  in  good  faith.  There  is  such  universal  acquiescence 
in  the  authorit}-  of  the  general  Government  that  the  mere 
presence  of  a  military  force,  without  regard  to  number,  is 
sufficient  to  maintain  order.  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  the  freed- 
man's  mind  (the  negro)  is  not  disabused  of  the  idea  (which 
has  come  from  the  agents  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau)  that 
a  freedman  has  a  right  to  live  without  care  or  provision  for 
the  future.  The  effect  of  the  belief  in  the  division  of  the 
land  is  idleness  and  the  accumulation  of  negroes  in  camps, 
towns  and  cities.  Vice  and  disease  will  tend  to  the  extermi- 
nation or  great  reduction  of  the  colored  race.  The  necessity 
of  governing  any  portion  of  our  territories  by  martial  law 
is  to  be  deplored.  If  resorted  to  it  should  be  limited  in  its 
authority,  and  should  leave  all  local  authorities  and  civil 
tribunals  free  and  unobstructed.  If  insurrection  does  come, 
the  law  provides  the  method  of  calling  out  the  forces  to 
suppress  it." 

These  were  the  reasonably  humane  opinions  Grant  report- 
ed to  President  Johnson  as  a  basis  of  action.  These  were 
Grant's  views  before  the  Republican  leaders  determined  to  im- 
peach, depose,  many  said  hang,  Johnson.  From  this  report 
Johnson  formulated  his  policy,  which  was  to  permit  the  States  of 
the  South  to  re-enter  the  Union  as  equals  and  himself  generously 
to  exercise  the  pardoning  power  toward  the  conquered  Confed- 
erates. The  Chicago  Times,  January  26,  1868,  tersely  defined 
Johnson's  policy  as  follows: 

"President  Johnson  is  in  favor  of  thirty-six  States  in 
the  Union,  instead  of  twenty-five.  He  advocates  the  exten- 
sion of  Federal  rights  to  the  whole  country  (including  the 
Southern  States.)  He  prefers  civil  over  militarv  author- 
ity." 


Chap.  15  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  87 

Republican  leaders  bitterly  opposed  this  humane  policy. 
In  the  ^March  number  of  the  North  American  Reviczv,  1870, 
Wendell  Phillips  explains  the  Republican  policy  and  why  it  was 
not  carried  out: 

"We  all  see  now,"  said  Phillips,  "that  niag-naniniity 
went  as  far  as  it  safely  could  when  it  granted  the  traitor  his 
life.  I  lis  land  should  have  been  taken  from  him  and  divid- 
ed among  the  negroes,  forty  acres  to  each  family.  Before 
Andrew  Johnson's  treachery,  every  traitor  would  have  been 
only  too  glad  to  have  been  let  off  with  his  life.  Every 
rebel  State  should  have  been  held  as  a  territory  under  the 
direct  rule  of  the  Government,  without  troublesome  ques- 
tions. In  his  last  years  the  late  Vice-President.  Henry 
Wilson,  confessed  to  me  that  our  party  made  a  great  mis- 
take in  not  carrying  out  this  policy.  His  only  excuse  was 
that  the  Republican  party  did  not  dare  risk  any  other  course 
in  the  face  of  the  Democratic  opposition." 

In  that  same  magazine,  same  year  and  month,  James  G. 
Blaine,  of  Maine,  says  that  Republicans  did  not  carry  out  that 
I)olicy,  because  it  would  have  led  to  the  overthrow  of  their  par- 
ty. No  sense  of  justice  or  of  mercy  to  the  people  of  the  South 
influenced  them.  While  the  two  policies  were  struggling  for 
dominance,  many  land  owners  in  the  South  hurried  off  to  Wash- 
ington to  obtain  "pardons"  for  the  crime  of  having  done  their 
best  to  defend  themselves  from  an  invading  host.  The  elder 
brother  of  the  writer  of  this,  an  officer  in  the  Confederate  army, 
was  among  the  number  of  "pardon"  seekers.  Johnson  received 
my  brother  in  a  friendly  way — the  two  men  before  the  war  had 
been  members  of  Congress  and  good  friends.  Neither  man 
made  any  reference  to  the  awful  four  years  that  lay  between 
their  parting  and  this  meeting.  My  brother  simply  said:  "Mr. 
President.  I  have  come  to  you,  an  applicant  for  'pardon.'  "  The 
last  words  must  have  stuck  in  my  brother's  throat,  knowing  as 
he  did  that  of  right  pardons  are  due  from  the  innocent  to  the 
guilty,  not  from  the  guilty  to  the  innocent.  But  of  this  noth- 
ing was  said.  Without  a  moment's  hesitation.  President  John- 
son turned  to  his  secretary  and  said:     "Make  out  a  pardon  for 

Mr.  ."  and  the  conversation  was  resumed,  as  if  no  gulf  of 

blood  lay  between  them.  With  the  fewest  exceptions,  Johnson 
granted  every  request  of  that  nature.  These  pardons  greatly 
angered  Republican  leaders.  They  had  set  their  very  souls  on 
confiscating     the     land     of       the  South,  dividing  it  and  giving 


88  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     15 

forty  acres  to  every  family  of  negroes.  A  pardon  was  supposed 
to  save  its  possessor's  land  from  confiscation.  The  first  at- 
tempt to  impeach  Johnson  was  based  on  the  charge  of  making 
the  "White  House  a  den  for  pardon  brokerage." 

With  one  of  these  little  pardon  papers  in  his  pocket,  though 
his  fields  were  laid  waste,  his  peach-trees  cut  down,  his  cattle 
killed,  his  cotton  gins,  barns,  stables,  dwelling  houses,  all  heaps  of 
ashes,  over  which  stood  the  chimneys  "lone  sentinels  over  the 
ruin ;"   despite   all   this    devastation,   the   poor    Confederate    sol- 
dier returned  to  his  despoiled  home  with  a  feeling  of  satisfaction 
in  the  thought  that  at  least  the  ground  under  his  feet  would  be 
a  resting  spot  for  wife  and  little  ones  to  stand  on.  and  work  in, 
and  look  up  from  to  the  blue  heavens  above,  and  they  thanked 
God  for  that  much  saved  from  the  awful  deluge  of  blood    and 
the  awful   waves  of  fiame  that  had   swept  over  their  country. 
My  brother  described  the  striking  change  he  had  observed  in  Mr. 
Johnson,  the  difference  in  the  man  since  last  they  parted,  the 
one  to  enter  the  camp  of  his  people's   deadliest   foes,   and  the 
other  to  take  up  arms  in  defense  of  home,  country,  life,  liberty ; 
all  that  men  hold  dear.     Then  Mr.  Johnson  was  a  strofig,  vigor- 
ous man,  fronting  the  world  and  fate,  hopefully  expecting  high 
success  in  life.     He  was  now  in  the  highest  office  in  the  land,  but 
his  aspect,  his  eyes,  showed  no  pleasure  in  that  success.     A  deep 
depression  seemed  to  weigh  upon  him ;  hope,  happiness  seemed 
to  have  fled.     The  whole  man  seemed  to  be  weary,  care-worn  j 
yet  in  spite  of  all  that    might  be  seen  the  man's  grim  resolution 
to  hold  his  own.  to  maintain  at  the  risk  of  his  life   the  policy  he 
had  determined  to  pursue.     Though  Johnson  was  on  the  conquer- 
or's side    and  my  brother  on  the  conquered,  the  latter  was  more 
to  be  envied.     ]  !e  felt  ihat  satisfaction  which  comes  from  h.iv- 
ing  perfonv.eu  a  duty  to  the  best  of  his  ability.     His  snnl  was 
tortured  by  no  remorse.     He  yielded  to  the  inevitable  without 
a  murmur,  realizing,  as  ali  the  men  of  the  South  did.  that  it  is 
no  new  thing  in  the  sad  history  of  humanity  for  the  wrong  to 
triumph  over  the  right.     The  writer  of  this  believes  that  An- 
drcA  Johnson  did  not  jom  handr  with  the  Republican  pa'tv  f;)r 
any  purpose   of   despotic   rule.     He   abandoned   his   people   be- 
cause he   was   deceived   into    the   belief   that    Republicans    were 
fighting  to  restore  the  ITnion  of  our  fathers.     Though  a  man  of 
strong  native  abilities.  Johnson's  faculties  and  information  were 
within  limited  boundaries.     He  knew  but  little  of  the  Southern 
people  beyond  his  own  East  Tennessee.  In  his  own  State.  John- 
son's political   enemies  had  accused  him   of  anarchistic  tenden- 


Chap.   15  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  89 

r 

cift--.  of  intense  hatred  of  the  wealthy  class.  One  orator  had 
lioliily.  from  the  stump,  said  "Andrew  Johnson  so  hates  rich 
men,  he  curses  God  in  his  heart  because  He  had  not  made  him 
ci  snake,  that  he  mi^ht  crawl  in  the  grass  and  bite  the  heels  of 
rich  mens'  children."  One  can  imagine  the  horror  that  must 
have  overwhelmed  Johnson  when  he  discovered  that  the  party 
to  serve  which  he  had  abandoned  his  own  people  and  State,  was 
monarchistic  to  its  heart  core,  and  had  no  intention  of  restoring 
the  Union  of  our  fathers  ;  instead  was  determined  to  kill  it,  and 
erect  on  its  ruins  an  Imperial  Government.  And  to  aid  these 
men  he  had  played  traitor  to  his  own  State,  to  his  own  people! 
Who  does  not  believe  when  Johnson  came  to  know  the  truth,  re- 
morse, like  a  venomous  serpent,  lifted  its  head  in  his  breast  and 
fastened  its  fangs  in  his  heart  and  gnawed  and  gnawed  night  and 
day.  He  had  forever  forfeited  the  affections  of  his  own  people, 
and  now  the  men  of  the  party  he  had  served  during  the  war 
hated  him  as  fiercely  as  they  hated  the  conquered  "Rebel"  lying 
with  iron  fetters  on  his  feet  in  the  dungeon  cell  of  Fort  Monroe. 
Though  every  day  of  his  life  a  thousand  curses  were  hurled  on 
the  name  of  that  "Rebel"  in  Fortress  INIonroe.  though  iron  chains 
and  ball  abraded  and  tortvtred  him,  though  he  was  on  the  con- 
quered side  and  Johnson  among  the  conquerors,  there  is  reason 
to  believe  that  patient  prisoner  was  a  less  miserable  man  than 
the  man  in  the  White  House.  The  former  felt  no  pangs  of  re- 
morse ;  he  well  knew  the  more  he  was  cursed  and  reviled,  the 
tenderer  and  stronger  would  be  the  love  of  his  own  people.  He 
was  threatened  with  the  death  due  to  felons  and  assassins,  but 
he  knew  no  accusation  of  his  enemies  would  abate  one  jot  the 
reverence,  the  esteem  his  own  people  gave  him.  ^^'hat  recom- 
pense had  Johnson?  Where  could  he  look  for  affection,  for» 
sympathy?  Not  one  particle  of  pride  or  pleasure  did  Johnson 
derive  from  the  high  qffice  he  was  in.  The  same  Nemesis  which 
had  struck  down  his  predecessor  as  he  was  about  to  take  his  sea;t 
for  another  four  years  on  the  throne  of  power,  had  upon  John- 
son her  sleepless  eyes,  and,  as  he  set  his  foot  on  the  first  step  of 
Power's  throne,  that  Nemesis  touched  it  with  her  fatal  finger, 
and  lo!  it  became  like  unto  red  hot  iron,  scorching,  shriveling, 
tormenting  his  very  soul  day  and  night  during  the  whole  period 
of  his  stormy  term. 

The  portrayals  of  AFr.  I^incoln's  personal  traits  contained  in 
preceding  pages  were  made  by  his  contemporaries,  who  knew  him 
well ;  some  of  whom  loved  him  well,  all  of  whom  now  demand 
for  him  the  highest  honors,  the  deepest  reverence  mortal  can  re- 


90  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     15 

ceive.  The  question  to  be  considered  is,  do  the  quaHties  of  Mr. 
Lincoln,  attested  by  men  of  his  own  party,  indicate  that  greatness 
of  soul,  purity  of  heart,  and  unselfish  devotion  to  principles  which 
merit  the  esteem  and  reverence  the  Republican  party  now  de- 
mands shall  be  awarded  to  him?  Or  do  they  betray  a  man  of 
coarse  nature,  a  self-seeking  politician,  who  craved  high  office, 
more  to  satisfy  his  own  burning  desire  for  distinction  than  to 
use  power  for  the  betterment  of  his  fellow  mortals  ?  If  the  first 
query  is  answered  in  the  negative,  the  next  question  will  be,  on 
what  rests  the  claim  made  for  Mr.  Lincoln,  of  greatness,  grandeur, 
goodness?  Does  this  claim  rest  on  the  solid  rock  of  beneficent 
acts  done  in  the  days  of  his  power,  or  on  a  foundation  of  sand, 
which  the  waters  of  Time  will  surely  undermine  and  wash  away? 
The  deeds  done  by  Mr.  Lincoln  in  the  days  of  his  great  power 
will  bear  witness  in  posterity's  court. 


PART  II 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

A)itagO)ustic  Principles.  The  Great  American  Monarchist.  Fed- 
eralists Fear  and  Hate  Democracy.  War  on  the  South  Began 
1796.  The  Olive  Branch.  The  Pelham  Papers.  New  Eng- 
land Begins  JVork  for  Disunion  and  Secession  in  1796. 

The  underlying  cause  of  every  conflict  between  man  and 
man,  tribe  and  tribe,  country  and  country,  has  been  on  the  one 
side  a  craving"  for  power,  on  the  other  side  an  effort  to  escape 
that  power.  The  nascent  spirit  of  one  is  Monarchy,  of  the  other 
Democracy.  These  two  principles  are  inherently  and  eternally 
antagonistic,  and  underHe  nearly,  if  not  every,  war  fought  on 
earth.  Stratas  of  superficial  causes  usually  overlay  and  cover 
up  the  real  causes  of  war.  as  they  did  in  the  war  on  the  South. 

The  seven  years'  war  which  severed  the  seceded  Colonies 
from  British  rule  was  an  open,  undisguised  fight  between  Mon- 
archy and  Democracy.  The  four  years'  war  between  the  South- 
ern and  "Northern  States  was  a  fight  between  the  same  old  ene- 
mies. Monarchy  and  Democracy,  though  the  astute  Republican 
party,  while  heart  and  soul  Imperialistic,  concealed  and  cov- 
ered up  that  principle  under  loud  declarations  of  Freedom  and 
blatant  professions  of  humanitarianism.  Under  these  h3'pocriti- 
cal  cloaks,  the  Monarchic  principles  had  full  swing  for  four 
years,  and  committed  every  species  of  crime  and  outrage  pecul- 
iar to  enraged  ^lonarchists.  When  the  soldiers  of  Monarchy 
in  1783  took  ships  and  sailed  Eastward  to  their  kingly  country, 
the  soldiers  of  Democracy  fondly  hoped  they  had  driven  their 
ancient  enemy  forever  from  this  New  Continent.  The  snake  was 
scotched,   but  not  killed.     Nor   was   it  banished.     It   remained 


92  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i6 

here  in  our  niidst  with  veiled  features  and  softened  voice,  bid- 
ing its  chance  to  up  and  regain  its  former  power. 

Alexander  Hamilton  was  the  head  and  front  of  American 
Monarchists.  He  wanted  to  make  this  Government  a  pure  Mon- 
archy. Hamilton  advocated  a  "strong  centralized  Government," 
of  imperial  policy. 

Gouverneur  Morris,  a  contemporary  and  friend  of  Hamilton. 
said : 

"Hamilton  hated  Republican  Government,  and  never 
failed  on  every  occasion  to  advocate  the  excellence  of  and 
avow  his  attachment  to  a  Monarchic  form  of  Government." 

From  the  formation  of  the  Union,  the  Federalists  of  New 
England  hated  and  feared  Democratic  principles.  Their  great 
leader,  Hamilton,  made  no  secret  of  this  feeling.  In  his  speech 
at  a  New  York  banquet  Hamilton,  in  high  opposition-  to  Jef- 
ferson's Democracy,  cried  out: 

"The  People !  Gentlemen,  I  tell  you  the  people  are  a 
great  Beast !" 

In  1796  Gov.  Walcott,  of  Connecticut,  said: 

"I   sincerely   declare   that   I   wish   the   Northern   States 
would  separate  from  the  Southern  the  moment  that  event 
(the  election  of  Jefiferson)  shall  take  place." 
Congressman  Plumer,  a  Federalist  and  an  ardent  Secession 
ist,  in  1804  declared  that — 

"All  dissatisfied  with  the  measures  of  the  Government  look- 
ed to  a  separation  of  the  States  as  a  remedy  for  grievances." 

As  early  as  1796  men  of  Massachusetts  began  to  talk  of 
New  England  seceding  from  the  Union.  It  was  declared  that 
if  Jay's  negotiation  closing  the  Mississippi  for  twenty  years 
could  not  be  adopted,  it  was  high  time  for  the  New  England 
States  to  secede  from  the  Union  and  form  a  Confederation  by 
themselves.  The  Monarchic  principles  did  not  thrive  under  Ham- 
ilton's lead.  Hamilton  was  too  plain  spoken.  The  Republican 
party  became  more  astute.  In  1861,  while  making  loud  profes- 
sions of  desiring  the  largest  freedom  for  the  people,  that  party 
was  making  ready  to  rob  them  of  every  liberty  they  possessed. 
"At  the  formation  of  this  Union,"  says  E.  P.  Powell,  "Hamilton 
laid  before  the  Constitutional  Convention  of  1787  eleven  propo- 
sitions, which  he  wished  to  make  the  basis  of  the  Union,  but  they 
were  so  Monarchistic  in  tone  they  received  no  support  what- 
ever." 


Chap,   i6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  93 

The  Republican  war  on  the  South  stood  soHdly  on  Monarchic 
principles.  The  principles  of  1776  were  set  aside  in  the  60s,  but 
not  for  years  after  the  South  was  conquered  did  Republicans 
openly  admit  they  were  inspired  by  the  spirit  of  Monarchy.  Dur- 
ing McKinley's  last  canipaii^n.  Hamilton  was  loudly  lauded  and 
Jefferson  decried  as  a  visionary,  a  French  anarchist.  Hamilton 
Clubs  w^ere  organized  and  Republican  novelists  set  to  writing  ro- 
rrsances  with  Hamilton  as  the  hero.  During  Garfield's  campaign, 
a  Republican  paper,  the  Lemars,  Iowa,  Sentinel,  said: 

"Garfield's  rule  will  be  the  transitory  period     between 
State  Sovereignty  and  National   Sovereignty.     The  United 
States  Senate  will  give  way  to  a  National  Senate.  State  Con- 
stitutions and  the  United  States  Senate  are  relics  of  State 
Sovereigntv   and   implements   of  treason.      Garfield's    Pres- 
idency will  be  the  Regency  of  Stahvartism  ;  after  that — Rex." 
Fate  used  the  hand  of  an  insane  "Stalwart"  to  impede,  if 
not  estop,  the  Monarchic  plans  of  that  time.  The  New  York  Sun, 
July  3rd,   1881,  quoted  President  Garfield  as  saying: 

"The  influence  of  Jefferson's  Democratic  principles  is 
rapidly  waning,  while  the  principles  of  Hamilton  are  rap- 
idly increasing.  Power  has  been  gravitating  toward  the  Cen- 
tral Government." 

Power  did  not  gravitate,  it  was  wrenched  at  one  jerk  to  the 
Central  Government  by  Lincoln's  hand,  as  will  be  seen  later  on. 
Not  until  after  Hamilton  and  Jefferson  had  passed  away  did  the 
followers  of  Jefferson  drop  the  name  "Republican"  which  they 
had  borne  during  his  life,  and  assume  the  name  "Democrat." 
Democracy — the  rule  of  the  people — is  more  expressive  of  Jeffer- 
son's doctrines.  Not  until  1854  did  the  men  of  the  Federal  and 
Whig  persuasion  unite  and  organize  a  party  and  take  the  name 
"Republican."  The  Republican  party  of  the  60s  was  the  legiti- 
mate offspring  of  the  old  New  England  Federalists,  and  inher- 
ited all  its  progenitor's  faiths,  hopes,  hates  and  purposes,  viz : 
Passion  for  power,  fear  and  hate  of  Democracy,  hate  of  the 
Union,  belief  in  States'  Rights,  in  States'  Sovereignty,  in  Seces- 
sion, and  the  strong  persistent  determination  to  break  the  Union 
asunder  and  form  of  the  Northeast  section  a  Northeastern  Con- 
federacv.  All  these  ideas  belonged  to  the  old  Federalists  of  New 
England,   and   were   handed   down   to   the   Republican   party   in 

1854. 

Wendell  Phillips.  New  England's  tongue  of  fire,  speaking  of 
the  inherent  purposes  of  his  part>',  said: 


94 


Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i6 


"The  Republican  party  is  in  no  sense  a  national  party. 
It  is  a  party  of  the  Xorth,  organized  against  the  South." 
The  Republican  party  zi'as  organized  against  the  South,  or- 
ganized to  fight  the  South  in  every  possible  way ;  to  fight  as  its 
progenitors,  the  Federalists,  had  fought  from  1796  to  1854,  with 
calumnies,  vituperations,  false  charges,  every  word  and  phrase 
hate  could  use,  until  the  time  came  to  use  guns,  bayonets,  bullets, 
cannon  balls  and  shells ;  and  faithfully  did  that  party  carry  out 
the  ignoble  and  cruel  purpose  of  its  organization.  The  war  on 
the  South  was  begun  by  the  Federalists  of  New  England  in  1796. 
In  18 14  a  work  of  some  four  hundred  and  fifty  pages,  called 
"The  Olive  Branch."  was  published  in  Boston,  which  throws  elec- 
tric light  on  certain  almost  forgotten  events  in  New  England's 
history.  "The  Olive  Branch"  contains  extracts  from  a  series  of 
remarkable  productions  called  the  "Pelham  Papers,"  which  ap- 
peared in  the  Connecticut  Courant  in  the  year  1796.  The  Coiir- 
ant  was  published  by  Hudson  and  Goodwin,  men  of  Revolutionary 
standing.  The  Pelham  Papers  were  said  to  have  been  the  joint 
production  of  men  of  the  first  talent  and  influence  in  the  State. 
Commenting  on  these  papers  of  1796,  the  "Olive  Branch"  of 
181 4  says: 

"A  Northeastern  Confederacy  has  been  the  object  for  a 
number  of  years.  They  (the  politicians  of  New  England) 
have  repeatedly  advocated  in  public  print,  separation  of  the 
States.  The  project  of  separation  was  formed  shortly  after 
the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution.  The  promulga- 
tion of  the  project  first  appeared  in  the  year  1796,  in  these 
Pelham  Papers.  At  that  time  there  was  none  of  that  cata- 
logue of  grievances  which  since  that  period,  have  been  fab- 
ricated to  justify  the  recent  attempt  to  dissolve  the  Union." 

This  refers  to  the  efforts  made  in  1804  and  1814  to  get  the 
New  England  States  to  secede  from  the  Union,  so  they  might 
be  separated  from  the  Democratic  Southern  and  Western  States. 
The  "Olive  Branch"  continues : 

"At  that  time  there  was  no  "\''irginia  Dvnastv,"  no 
"Democratic  Madness,"  nO  "war  with  Great  Britain."  The 
affairs  of  the  country  seemed  to  be  precisely  according  to 
New  England's  fondest  wishes.  Yet  at  that  favorable  time 
(1796)  New  England  was  dissatisfied  with  the  Union  and 
begun  to  plot  to  get  out  of  it.  The  common  people,  however, 
were  not  then  ready  to  break  up  the  Union.  The  common 
people  at  that  time  had  no  dislike  of  the  Southern  States. 


Chap.   i6  1'\\(Ts  and  Falsehoods.  95 

Then  New  England  writers,  preachers  and  poHticians  de- 
hberately  begun  the  wicked  work  of  poisoning  their  minds 
against  the  Southern  States.  To  sow  hostiHty,  discord  and 
jealousy  between  the  different  sections  of  the  Union  was  the 
first  step  New  England  took  to  accomplish  her  favorite  object, 
a  separation  of  the  States.  Without  this  efficient  instrument. 
all  New  England's  efforts  would  have  been  utterly  imavail- 
ing.  Had  the  honest  yeomanry  of  the  Eastern  States  con- 
tinued to  respect  and  regard  their  Southern  fellow-citizens 
as  friends  and  brothers,  having  one  common  interest  in  the 
promotion  of  the  general  welfare,  it  would  be  impossible  to 
have  made  them'  instruments  in  the  unholy  work  of  destroy- 
ing the  noble,  the.  splendid  Union." 

But  for  the  unholy  work  of  having  taught  the  common  peo- 
ple of  New  England  to  hate  the  people  of  the  South,  the  cruel 
war  of  the  60s  would  never  have  been  fought. 

"For  eighteen  years,"  continues  the  "Olive  Branch"  (the 
eighteen  years  from  1796  to  1814),  "the  most  unceasing  en- 
deavors have  been  used  to  poison  the  minds  of  the  people  of 
the  Eastern  States  toward,  and  to  alienate  them  from,  their 
fellow-citizens  of  the  Southern  States.  The  people  of  the 
South  have  been  portrayed  as  "demons  incarnate,"  as  des- 
titute of  all  the  "good  qualities  which  dignify  and  adorn  hu- 
man nature."  Nothing  can  exceed  the  virulence  of  the  pict- 
ures drawn  of  the  South's  people,  their  descriptions  of  whom 
would  more  have  suited  the  ferocious  inhabitants  of  New 
Zealand  than  a  polished,  civilized  people." 

The  following  extracts  are  from  the  Pelham  Papers,  publish- 
ed in  the  Hartford  Coiirant,  1796: 

EXTRACT  NO.  i. 

"The  question  must  soon  be  decided  whether  we  shall 
continue  as  one  Nation.  Many  advantages  were  supposed 
to  be  secured  and  many  evils  avoided  by  a  Union  of  States, 
but  at  that  time  those  advantages  and  evils  were  magni- 
fied to  far  greater  size  than  either  would  be  if  the  question 
at  this  moment  was  to  be  settled.  The  Northern  States 
can  subsist  as  a  Nation,  a  Republic,  without  any  connection 
with  the  Southern.  If  the  Southern  people  were  possessed 
with  the  same  political  ideas,  our  Union  would  be  more 
dose  than  in  separation." 


c)6  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.     t6 

EXTRACT  NO.  2. 

"It  is  a  serious  question  whether  we  shall  part  with 
the  States  South  of  the  Potomac.  No  man  north  of  that 
river,  ivhose  heart  is  not  thoroughly  Democratic,  can  hesi- 
tate what  decision  to  make.  In  a  future  paper  I  shall  con- 
sider some  of  the  great  events  which  will  lead  to  the  sep- 
aration of  the  United  States.  I  will  endeavor  to  prove 
the  impossibility  of  a  Union,  lasting  for  any  long  period,  in 
the  future,  both  from  the  moral  and  political  habits  of  the 
Southern  States.  I  will  carefully  examine  and  see  whether 
we  have  not  already  approached  the  era  when  the  Union 
of  States  must  be  divided."' 

All  through  these  extracts  the  reader  will  see  it  is  the  prin- 
ciple of  Democracy  which  New  England  men  wished  to  escape. 

The  "Olive  Branch"  of  1814  comments  on  the  Pelham  Pa- 
pers as  follows : 

"It  is  impossible  for  a  man  of  intelligence  to  read  the 
Pelham  Papers  without  feeling  a  decided  conviction  that 
the  writers,  and  their  friends,  were  determined  to  use  all 
their  endeavors  to  dissolve  the  Union,  in  order  to  promote 
their  sectional  views.  These  papers  offer  a  complete  clue 
to  all  the  sectional  proceedings  that  have  occurred  since 
that  period." 

From  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History,  published  in  1864,  from 
the  "Olive  Branch,"  published  in  1814,  and  from  the  Pelham 
Papers,  published  in  1796,  we  learn: 

1st.  That  the  Federal  leaders  of  New  England,  in  1796, 
advocated  disunion,  and  were  eager  to  get  New  England  to  se- 
cede from  the  Union,  and  to  form  a  Northeastern  Confederacy. 

2nd.  On  finding  that  the  common  people  of  New  England 
did  not  favor  secession,  did  not  want  disunion,  did  not  dislike 
tlic  Southern  States,  and  were  proud  of  the  Union,  the  Federal 
leaders  resorted  to  measures  to  convert  the  masses  to  their  views 
on  secession  and  disunion. 

3rd.  These  measures  were  of  the  meanest,  the  most  con- 
temptible character;  were  a  direct  and  1  ase  violation  of  the  Ninth 
Commandment,  "Thou  shalt  not  bear  false  witness."  Poli- 
ticians, newspapers,  and  preachers  of  New  England  engaged  in 
the  evil  work  of  bearing  false  witness  against  the  people  of  the 
Southern  States,  whom  they  painted  as  '"savages."  as  "barbari- 
ans," as  "demons  incarnate,"  as  unfit  to  live  in  the  "same  Union 
witli  the  virtuous  people  of  New  England." 


Chap.   i6  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


97 


The  following-  extracts  from  the  "Olive  Branch"  throw  light 
on  this  subject,: 

"The  increasing-  etTort  to  excite  the  public  mind  to  that 
feverish  state  of  discord,  jealousy,  and  exasperation,  which 
was  necessary  to  prepare  it  for  the  consummation  of  their 
desire  (the  secession  of  the  Eastern  States),  the  unhol\' 
spirit  which  inspired  the  writers  of  these  dissolution  senti- 
ments has  been  from  that  hour  (1796  to  the  present 
(1814)  incessantly  employed  to  excite  hostility  between  the 
different  sections  of  the  Union.  To  such  horrible  length 
has  this  spirit  been  carried  that  many  paragraphs  have  ap- 
peared in  the  Boston  papers  intended  to  excite  the  negroes 
of  the  South  to  rise  and  massacre  the  whites.  This  is  a  spe- 
cies of  baseness  of  which  the  world  has  produced  few  exam- 
ples." 

The  baseness  was  indeed  extraordinary  in  face  of  the  fact 
that  these  efforts  to  instigate  negroes  to  rise  and  massacre  the 
whites  of  the  South  were  made  while  the  people  of  New  Eng- 
land w^ere  still  enriching  themselves  by  carrying  on  the  slave 
traffic.  The  third  extract,  taken  from  the  Pelham  Papers  of  1796, 
is  astonishing. 

EXTRACT  NO.  3. 

"If  the  negroes  were  good  for  food,"  said  a  Pelham 
Paper,  "the  probability  is  that  the  power  of  destroying  their 
lives  would  be  enjoyed  by  their  Southern  owners  as  fully  as  it 
is  over  the  lives  of  their  cattle.  Their  laws  do  not  prohibit 
their  killing  their  slaves  because  those  slaves  are  human  be- 
ings, or  because  it  is  a  moral  evil  to  destroy  them.  Negroes 
are  looked  on  only  as  brutes ;  they  are  fed  or  kept  hungry, 
clothed  or  kept  naked,  beaten  and  turned  out  to  the  fury  of 
the  elements,  with  as  little  remorse  as  if  thev  were  beasts  of 
the  field." 

The  "Olive  Branch"  indignantly  comments  on  these  slander- 
ous lies  on  the  Southern  people  as  follows : 

"Never  were  mor^  infamous  and  false  charges  made  on 
a  people.  Never  more  disgraceful  to  their  authors.  The 
turpitude  of  the  writers  'is  enhanced  by  the  fact  that  at  the 
period  these  charges  were  made,  negro  slavery  existed  in 
the  New  England  and  other  Eastern  States,  and  at  that  mo- 


9^  Facts  ax\d  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i6 

ment,  and   for  long  afterward.   New  England  was  actively 
engaged  in  the  slave  traffic." 

The  "Olive  Branch"  continues  thus: 

"Some  progress  was  made  (toward  teaching  the  com- 
mon people  of  New  England  to  hate  the  South),  but  the  yeo- 
manry of  the  Eastern  States  did  not  feel  disposed  to  quarrel 
with  the  South  for  their  supposed  want  of  piety  and  moral- 
ity. I  do  not  assert  that  these  contemptible  charges  were 
laid  down  in  regular  form  as  a  thesis  to  argue  upon,  but  I 
do  aver  that  they  form  the  basis  of  three-fourths  of  all  the 
essays,  paragraphs,  and  squibs  that  have  appeared  in  the  Bos- 
ton papers  against  the  Administration  for  many  years.  'The 
Road  to  Ruin,'  ascribed  to  John  Lowell,  is  remarkable  for 
its  virulence,  its  acrimony,  its  intemperance,  and  the  talent 
of  the  writer.  But  if  you  extract  from  his  essays  the  as- 
sumption of  these  positions,  all  the  rest  is  mere  caput  mor~ 
tiiiim.  The  charges  against  the  South  are  many,  and  in 
endless  succession.  These  charges,  however  absurd,  how- 
ever extravagant  they  appear  in  their  nake.d  form,  have,  bv 
dint  of  incessant  repetition,  made  such  an  impression  on  the 
minds  of  a  large  portion  of  the  people  of  the  Northeastern 
States  that  they  are  thoroughly  convinced  of  their  truth. 
The  Rev.  Jebadiah  Morse,  in  his'  geography,  attempted  to 
perpetuate  these  vile  prejudices.  Almost  every  page  that 
represent  his  own  section  of  the  Union  is  highly  encomi- 
umistic.  Everything  is  covered  with  flattering  tints.  When 
he  passes  the  Susquehanna,  what  a  hideous  reverse !  Everv- 
thing  there  is  frightful  caricature.  Society  is  at  a  low  ebb, 
the  somber  tints  are  used  in  order  to  elevate  by  contrast 
his  own  section ,  his  Elysium,  the  New  England  States.  He 
dipped  his  pen  in  gall  when  he  portrayed  the  manners,  hab- 
its and  religion  of  Virginia,  Maryland,  the  Carolinas,. Geor- 
gia, or  the  Western  country." — (Logic  of  History.) 

The  children  of  New  England  who  studied  the  old  Morse 
geography,  when  grown,  were  ready  to  accept  and  credit  the 
slander  on  the  South  conveyed  by  maps  issued  in  New  England 
in  1856,  half  white,  half  black ;  the  white  half  intended  to  repre- 
sent enlightened  New  England,  the  black  half  the  barbarous  States 
of  the  South. 

From  S.  D.  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History,  published  1864, 
I  get  the  following : 


Chap.  i6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  99 

"The  Northeastern  States  early  sought  to  create  prej- 
udice and  disunion  sentiment,  not  on  account  of  anv  exist- 
ing fact,  but  to  array  section  against  section,  to  stimulate 
hate  and  discord  for  the  purpose  of  accelerating  their  darl- 
ing object,  the  dissolution  of  the  Union  and  the  formation 
of  a  Northeastern  Confederacy.  Press,  politicians  and 
preachers  were  continually  harping  on  causes  which  made 
disunion  desirable.  The  motives  which  actuated  New  Eng- 
land disunionists  was  the  desire  to  have  what  Hamilton 
called  a  strong  government,  understood  to  mean  an  autoc- 
racy similar  to  that  of  England,  a  large  standing  army,  a 
heavy  public  debt,  owned  by  the  favored  few,  to  whom  the 
common  masses  should  pay  tribute,  under  the  guise  of  inter- 
est. The  main  public  offices  were  to  be  held  by  the  rich 
and  noble  for  long  periods,  or  for  life.  It  was  argued  that 
a  national  debt  would  be  a  national  blessing,  and  prohibi- 
tive tariff,  under  the  guise  of  protection,  be  a  blessing.  These 
were  the  motives  which  led  the  early  Federalists  to  want  dis- 
union." 

The  reader's  attention  is  particularly  called  to  the  fact  that 
during  all  the  years  which  the  Federalists  of  New  England  were 
teaching  the  gospel  of  hate  toward  the  people  of  the  South,  there 
was  no  anti-slavery  sentiment  mixed  with  that  hate.  On  the 
contrary,  the  hate  begun  while  New  England  was  enriching 
herself  by  the  slave  traffic,  and  while  slaves  were  still  held  in 
New  England.  Not  until  some  years  after  the  end  of  the  second 
war  with  Great  Britain  did  New  England  mingle  and  mix  anti- 
slavery  sentiment  with  her  animosity  toward  the  people  of  the 
South.  When  the  Democrat,  Jefferson,  succeeded  the  Federalist, 
Adams,  and  the  Federalists  of  New  England,  as  they  put  it,  "saw 
power  slipping  from  their  grasp,"  their  hope  to  effect  disunion 
rose  high.     They  set  to  work  with  great  energy. 

I  charge  that  the  gospel  of  hate  inaugurated  by  New  England 
Federalists  in  1796  was  the  beginning  of  the  war  on  the  South. 
I  charge  that  hate  of  Democracy  was  at  the  very  bottom  of  that 
war ;  T  charge  that  the  South  was  hated  because  she  was  solidly 
Democratic.  The  Republican  party,  which,  as  Philips  said, 
was  organized  against  the  South,  had  inherited  all  the  Federalists 
hate  of  Democracy,  hate  of  the  Union,  hate  of  the  South,  and 
with  great  zeal  and  eloquence,  from  the  hour  of  its  organization 
in  1854,  had  preached  the  gospel  of  those  three  hates.  Calumnies 
on  the  South  were  poured  out  in  streams  until  all  new  England 


iCMD  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     17 

became  infected  as  with  a  blood  poison.  The  virulence  of  this 
hate  never  abated,  never  ceased,  and  finally  culminated  in  that  aw- 
ful deluge  of  blood  which  overwhelmed  the  Southland  in  the  60s. 
Wars  do  not,  like  mushrooms,  spring-  up  in  a  single  night.  Nor  do 
they,  like  rank  weeds,  grow  strong  and  full  statured  in  a  day  or 
a  week.  They  have  their  roots  deep  in  the  years  of  the  past.  The 
roots  of  the  war  on  the  South  began  to  vitalize  in  the  year  1796; 
those  roots  yet  lie  fathoms  deep  under  New  England  soil ;  they  yet 
live. 


CHAPTER   XVII. 

Republicans  Cover  up  the  Real  Cause  of  the  War.  Xeic  England 
Secessionists.  Early  and  Universal  Belief  in  the  Right  of 
Secession. 

In  J.  C.  Ridpath's  history  of  the  war  between  the  States,  he 
undertakes  to  give  the  cause  which  led  to  war.     He  says: 

"The  first  and  most  general  cause  of  the  war  was  the 
different  construction  put  upon  the  national  Constitution 
by  the  people  of  the  North  and  the  South.  This  diflference 
of  opinion  has  always  existed.  The  North  held  that  the 
Union  is  indestructible  under  the  Constitution  ;  that  the  high- 
est allegiance  of  citizens  is  due  to  the  Union,  not  to  their 
own  State ;  that  all  attempts  at  disunion  are  treasonable. 
The  South  held  that  the  Constitution  is  a  compact  between 
sovereign  States,  and  that  a  State  or  States  can  yvithdraw 
from   the   compact   they    themselves   made." 

Although  Mr.  Ridpath  has  five  letters,  A.  M.,  L.  L.  D.,  ap- 
pended to  his  name  to  indicate  his  high  standing  in  the  world  of 
letters,  the  most  ignorant  ploughman  of  the  country  could  have 
made  no  greater  mistake.  At  no  period  in  the  history  of  Amer- 
ica before  the  war  did  any  such  distinct  difiference  of  opinion 
on  this  subject  divide  the  people  of  the  North  from  the  people 
of  the  South.  On  the  contrary,  the  student  of  New  England's  his- 
tory knows  that  from  the  very  formation  of  the  Union,  New 
England's  foremost  politicians  were  dissatisfied  with  it  and  begun 
to  plan  and  plot  to  bring  about  disunion.  Up  to  the  very  be- 
ginning of  the  war  on  the  South,  the  Republican  party  advocated 
the  principle  of  State  sovereignty  and  the  right  of  secession. 
The  people  of  New  England  were  the  first  to  hate  the  ITnion,  the 
first  to  desire  secession,  the  first  to  strive  to  split  the  Union  into 
two  parts  and  to  form  of  one  part  a  Northeastern  Confederacy 


Chap.   17  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  ioi 

composed  of  Northeastern  States.  The  benefit  that  would  re- 
sult to  New  England  from  secession  was  openly  discussed,  as  we 
have  shown,  as  early  as  1796.  Colonel  Timothy  Pickering,  an 
officer  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  afterwards  Postmaster-Gen- 
eral and  Secretary  of  War  and  Secretary  of  State  in  Washing- 
ton's Cabinet,  and  after  that  a  Senator  for  many  years  from 
Massachusetts,  was  a  Federalist  whd  believed  strongly  in  the  right 
of  secession  and  in  the  advantages  that  would  accrue  to  New 
England  if  she  would  separate  herself  from  the  Union,  and  there- 
by from  legal  contact  with  Democracy.  In  one  of  his  letters 
Pickering  talks  of  the  "corrupt  and  corrupting  influence  of 
Southern  Democracy,"  and  adds : 

"But  I  will  not  despair  :  I  will  rather  anticipate  a  new 
Confederacy,  exempt  from  Democracy's  influence.  The 
principles  of  our  Revolution  point  to  the  remedy — a  separa- 
tion ;  that  this  can  be  accomplished  without  spilling  one 
drop  of  blood,  I  have  little  doubt." 

Governor  Walcott.  of  Connecticut,  on  this  subject,  said : 

"I  sincerely  declare  that  I  wish  the  Northern  States 
would  separate  from  the  Union  the  moment  that  event  (the 
election  of  Jefferson)  shall  take  place." 

In  1794   Fisher  Ames  said: 

"The  spirit  of  insurrection  has  tainted  a  vast  extent  of 
country  besides  Pennsylvania." 

This  referred  to  the  spirit  of  disunion  spreading  in  New 
England.  The  desire  for  disunion  came  from  fear  and  hate  of 
Democracy.  It  was  declared  in  Massachusetts  that  if  "Jay's  ne- 
gotiations closing  up  the  Mississippi  for  twenty  years  could  not  be 
adopted  it  was  high  time  for  the  New  England  States  to  secede 
from  the  Union." 

Every  few  years  something  occurred  which  made  New 
England  declare  it  was  high  time  for  her  to  get  out  of  the 
Union.  When  Louisiana  Territory  was  purchased,  and  again 
when  Louisiana  was  made  a  State,  New  England  declared  it  was 
time  for  her  to  quit  the  Union.  During  the  whole  two  years 
this  country  was  waging  its  second  war  with  Great  Britain,  New 
England  preachers,  newspapers,  and  politicians  were  anxious 
for  secession,  declaring  it  was  high  time  New  England  was  out 
of  the  L^nion,  anxious  for  New  England  to  make  a  separate 
treaty  of  peace  with  old  England.  Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge, 
in  his  life  of  Webster,  says : 


I02  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     17 

"It  is  safe  to  say  there  was  no  man  in  this  country,  from 
Washington  and  Hamilton  on  the  one  side  to  George  Clin- 
ton and  George  Mason  on  the  other,  who  regarded  our  sys- 
tem of  Government,  when  first  adopted,  as  anything  but  an 
experiment  entered  upon  by  the  States,  and  from  which 
each  and  every  State  had  the  right  to  peaceably  withdraw, 
a  right  which  was  very  likely  to  be  exercised." 

A  convention  in  Ohio  in  1859  declared  the  Constitution  was 
a  compact  to  which  each  State  acceded  as  a  State,  and  as  an  in- 
tegral part,  and  that  each  State  had  the  right  to  judge  for  it- 
self of  infractions  and  of  the  mode  and  measure  of  redress,  and 
to  this  declaration  Joshua  Giddings,  Wade,  Chase  and  Den- 
nison  assented. 

Later  on  extracts  from  speeches  made  by  the  foremost  men 
in  the  Republican  ])arty  advocating  secession,  such  men  as  Lin- 
coln, Wade  of  Ohio,  Philips  of  Massachusetts,  will  be  given. 
First  will  be  given  extracts  from  a  work  by  E.  P.  Powell,  of  New 
York,  called  "Nullification  and  Secession,"  which  throw  light 
on  New  England's  effort  to  secede  from  the  Union  in  1803  and 
1804.     Powell  says : 

"Of  the  Federal  leaders  in  1803,  there  remained  in  Wash- 
ington, among  others,  Tracy,  Griswald,  Plumer  and  Picker- 
ing. These  beheld  with  dismay  and  horror  the  dissolution 
of  their  party  and  their  own  loss  of  power.  They  foimd 
themselves  out  of  the  offices  of  the  Nation,  and  Republicans 
(Democrats)  pursuing  them  into  their  own  States,  depriv- 
ing them  of  emoluments  and  honor.  Angry,  affrighted  at 
their  situations,  they  cried  out :  'The  South  has  clearly  in- 
vaded our  rights.      Thomas  Jefferson  is  President.'  " 


'0:»' 


Jeffersonian  principles  were  the  object  of  their  fear  and  hate. 
Governor  Walcott,  years  before,  ha  ddeclared  that  if  Jefiferson 
was  elected  to  the  Presidency  he  would  want  New  England  to 
leave  the  Union. 

"The  people,"  says  Powell,  "en  masse  were  follo\vers  of 
Jefiferson.  Nothing  was  left  of  the  Federal  party  in  1800- 
3-4  but  a  gang  of  hopeless,  disappointed  leaders.  These 
men  had  been  recreant  to  their  trust.  The  history  of  the 
Federal  party  has  been  one  of  high  taxation,  high  salaries, 
usurpation  of  power  and  despotic  legislation.  Intrigue,  cor- 
ruption, tyranny,  had  been  the  triumvirate  of  its  short 
rule  under  Adams.     It  rioted  to  its  own  destruction." 


Chap.   17  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  103 

Will  not  every  word  of  the  above  apply  to  the  rule  of  the 
Republican  party?  Every  word  except  those  in  the  last  line, 
"It  rioted  to  its  own  destruction."  Not  yet  has  the  Republican 
party  rioted  to  its  destruction.  It  still  has  its  strong  grip  on 
the  Government  machinery,  and  still  maintains  itself  in  power 
and  place,  but  the  end  of  its  rule  is  bound  to  come.  It  has  made 
of  this  Government  an  imperial  power.  It  has  divided  the  peo- 
ple of  America  into  two  classes ;  on  one  side  the  ofifice-holders 
are  our  rulers ;  millionaires  are  the  nobility,  which  support  the 
throne  of  power  on  which  our  rulers  sit.  On  the  other  side  are 
the  laborers  who  toil  and  sweat  to  earn  the  wealth  our  rulers  and 
nobility  revel  in. 

^Vleanwhile,  monarchs  of  the  Old  World  grin  with  delight 
over  Democracy's  downfall,  and  reach  their  hands  across  the 
ocean,  jovially  saying  to  our  rulers,  "Hail,  brothers!" 

Not  only  is  the  history  of  the  Republican  party  one  of  high  tax- 
ation, high  salaries,  usurpation  of  power,  despotic  legislation,  but 
it  is  the  history  of  more  bloodshed,  more  misery,  more  anguish 
of  soul  than  any  other  history  of  the  same  number  of  years  in  the 
Nineteenth  Century.  Every  pen  that  writes  that  history  is  dipped 
in  the  blood  of  men  slaughtered  in  the  most  unnecessary,  re- 
morseless, cruel  war  ever  waged  between  two  English-speaking 
peoples. 

Finding  themselves  out  of  power  and  place,  the  Federals  of 
1804  set  themselves  actively  to  work  on  their  old  schemes  to  sever 
the  Union  in  twain,  for  the  purpose  of  forming  a  Northeastern 
Confederacy. 

Powell  says : 

"These  Federalists  undertook  to  pull  down  what  Wash- 
ington and  Jefferson  had  builded,  that  they  might  rule  in  2. 
corner  of  its  ruins !" 

The  man  who  fancies  that  the  secession  of  New  England 
or  of  any  State  from  the  Union  would  leave  it  in  ruins  is  not  only 
ignorant  of  the  logic  of  history,  but  is  a  foolish  believer  in  the 
divine  right  of  governments  as  against  the  inherent  rights  of 
the  people.  AVhether  Air.  Powell  ranks  himself  a  Democrat  or 
an  Imperialist,  I  know  not,  but  I  do  know  that  when  any  man 
talks  of  this  great  American  people  being  ruined  by  the  with- 
drawal of  one  or  of  a  dozen  States,  he  talks  from  the  imperial- 
istic standpoint,  the  kingly  standpoint,  which  made  George  the 
Stupid  in  1776  fancy  his  empire  would  be  ruined  if  the  thirteen 
jewels  from  his  crown  were  not  restored.  Thinkers  of  this  sort 
entirely  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  the  "people,''  the  great  body 


I04  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     17 

of  the  people,  is  the  country,  not  the  mere  machinery  of  the  Gov- 
ernment and  the  few  men  who  run  that  machinery.  The  Roman 
Empire  broke  asunder,  but  were  the  people  of  Europe  any  the 
worse  ? 

Had  the  New  England  secessionists  succeeded  in  1796,  or 
in  1804,  or  in  1814,  to  get  New  England  out  of  the  Union,  and 
had  they  formed  of  her  States  a  Northeastern  Confederacy,  in 
all  human  probability  no  gulf  would  have  been  dug  between  the 
Southern  and  Northern  States,  no  gulf  filled  with  the  blood  and 
bones  of  slaughtered  men.  No  Democratic  President  would 
have  resorted  to  bloody  coercion. 

President  Aladison,  in  181 4,  was  not  ignorant  of  the  secession 
work  going  on  in  New  England  during  the  time  this  country  was 
in  the  throes  of  war  with  a  powerful  foe,  but  Madison  took  no 
step  to  punish  or  estop  New  England's  secession.  As  a  true 
Democrat,  he  knew  if  the  people  of  New  England  chose  to  se- 
cede they  had  the  right.  Secession  failed  in  1796,  because,  as  the 
secessionists  themselves  put  it,  "the  common  people  did  not 
feel  power  slipping  from  their  grasp,  as  the  leaders  did." 

Mr.  Powell  gives  extracts,  showing  how  the  politicians  and 
newspapers  of  New  England  worked  for  the  secession. of  New 
England  in  1803  and  1804.  From  "Nullification  and  Secession  " 
we   take   the   following : 

Mr.  Rive,  of  Connecticut,  wrote  Tracy  in  Congress : 

"I  have  seen  many  of  our  friends,  and  all  I  have  seen, 
and  many  I  have  heard  from,  believe  we  must  separate,  and 
that  this  is  the  most  favorable  moment." 

Timothy  Pickering  wrote : 

"The  people  of  the  East  cannot  reconcile  their  habits 
and  views  and  interests  to  those  of  the  South  and  West." 

Ex-Governor  Griswald  wrote  Oliver  Walcott : 

"The  project  we  had  formed  was  to  induce  the  Legisla- 
tures of  the  New  England  States  which  remain  Federal  to 
commence.  They  should  call  for  a  re-union  of  the  North- 
ern States." 

The  three   States  Mr.   Griswald   relied   on   were   Massachu- 
sett.s  (then  including  Maine),  Connecticut  and  New  Hampshire. 
Pickering  wrote : 

"I  believe  the  proposition  to  secede  will  be  welcomed 
in  Connecticut,  and  can  we  doubt  in  New  Hampshire?  New 
York  must  be  associated;  how  is  her  concurrence  to  be  ob- 


Cii Ai'.    17  Facts  and  Fai.skhoods.  105 

tained?  New  York  must  be  made  the  center  of  the  New- 
Confederacy.  Vermont  and  New  Jersey  will  follow,  of 
course,  and  Rhode  Island  of  necessity." 

George  Cabot  was  cautious.     He  wrote : 

"While  a  separation  at  some  remote  period  may  take 
place,  I  think  separation  now  is  impracticable.  The  multitude 
do  not  feel  as  the  leaders,  who  saw  power  sliding  from  their 
grip.  We  shall  go  the  wa}-  of  all  governments  wholly  pop- 
ular, from  bad  to  worse,  until  the  evils,  no  longer  tolerable, 
shall  generate  their  own  remedies." 

After  consulting  Chief  Justice   Parsons,   Fisher  Ames,  and 
Atkins,  Cabot  wrote  from  Boston: 

"While  some  of  the  same  opinion  as  Pickering  think  the 
time  not  quite  ready,  for  myself  I  cannot  believe  essential 
good  will  come  from  separation  while  we  retain  the  maxims 
and  principles  (Democratic)  which  all  experience  and  reason 
pronounce  to  be  impracticable  and  absurd.  Even  in  New 
England,  where  there  is  more  wisdom  and  virtue  than  in  any 
other  part  of  the  United  States,  we  are  too  Democratic  alto- 
gether, and  I  hold  Democracy  to  be  the  government  of  the 
worst." 

"More  virtue  and  wisdom."     This  is  a  sample  of  New  Eng- 
land's self-righteousness. 

Griswald  was  in  despair.     He  wrote  Walcott  that — 

"While  we  are  waiting  for  the  time  to  arrive  in  New 
England,  it  is  certain  that  Democracy  is  making  daily  inroads 
on  us,  and  our  means  of  resistance  are  lessening  every  day. 
Yet  it  appears  impossible  to  induce  our  friends  to  make  any 
decisive  exertions." 

Democracy  was  always  the  object  of  New  England's  hate. 

"A  Democracy,"  wrote  Dennis'  Portfolio,  "is  scarcely 
tolerable  at  any  period.  It  is  on  trial  here  and  the  issue  will 
l)e  civil  war." 

The  war  came  in  the  60s  ;  Democracy  on  one  side.  Imperial- 
ists on  the  other. 

Fisher  Ames  said : 

"Our  country  is  too  big  for  Union,  too  sordid  for  patriot- 
ism, too  Democratic  for  liberty." 


io6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     17 

Cabot  is  credibly  reported  to  have  openly  advocated  a  Pres- 
ident for  life,  and  a  hereditary  Senate. 

P>bruary  18,  1804,  Burr  was  nominated  for  the  Governor's 
office  in  Nev^^  York. 

Pickering  wrote: 

"The  Federalists  anxiously  desire  Burr's  election.  If 
a  separation  of  States  is  deemed  proper  for  the  New  England 
States,  New  York  and  New  Jersey  will  naturally  be  united. 
If  Colonel  Burr  becomes  Governor  of  New  York  by  Federal 
votes,  will  he  not  be  considered  the  head?" 

Griswald  replied : 

"Such  is  the  jealousy  of  Massachusetts,  it  will  be  nec- 
essary to  allow  her  to  take  the  lead.  Her  magnitude  and 
jealousy  will  render  it  necessary  that  the  operation  begin 
there.  The  first  active  measures  must  come  from  Massa- 
chusetts' Legislature  next  summer." 

Hamilton  wrote: 

"Dismemberment  of  our  Union  will  give  no  relief  to  our 
real  disease,  which  is  Democracy,  the  poison  of  which  by 
subdivision  will  only  be  more  concentrated  in  each  part,  and 
the  poison  become  more  virulent." 

Always  Democracy. 

Pickering  wrote : 

"By  supporting  Mr.  Burr  we  gain  some  support,  though 
of  a  doubtful  nature.  We  think  Burr  alone  can  break  the 
Democratic  phalanx." 

George  Cabot  wrote : 

"If  delay  is  tolerated.  Democracy  will  have  its  work  of 
ruin  accomplished." 

Still  harping  on  Democracy. 

Congressman  Plumer  announced  that  a  convention  (in 
the  interest  of  secession)  would  be  held  in  the  fall  and  that  Ham- 
ilton would  attend.  Burr  was  not  elected  Governor  of  New 
York,  and  soon  after,  in  a  duel,  he  killed  Hamilton.  The  plan- 
ned convention  fell  through,  the  Federals  lost  hope  of  the  im- 
mediate success  of  secession,  but  their  work  in  that  direction  did 
not  cease. 

Cabot  wrote: 
."We  must  wait.     If  the  United  States  can  be  involved  in 
another  war  with  Great  Britain,  our  chance  will  come." 


Chap.   i8  Facts  and  Fai^sehoods.  107 

They  waited  for  that  chance,  but  never  slackened  in  preach- 
ing the  gospel  of  hate ;  on  the  contrary,  the  virulence  of  that 
hate,  augmented  as  the  years  went  by,  hate  of  Democracy,  hate 
of  the  Union,  because  its  highest  officers  were  Democrats,  hate 
of  the  South  because  her  people  were  a  unit  in  voting  for  Dem- 
ocratic officials. 

Mr.  Powell  says: 

"In  all  these  efforts  to  sever  the  Union  there  was  no 
anti-slavery  sentiment." 

Nor  was  any  anti-slavery  sentiment  mixed  with  all  their  hate 
of  the  South.  Federal  hate  of  the  Union  and  desire  to  secede 
was  based  on  fear  and  hate  of  Democracy. 

Powell  says : 

"It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  not  once  in  all  this  plot- 
ting of  1803  and  1804  was  the  right  of  a  State,  or  of  a  group 
of  States,  to  secede  questioned.  The  only  argument  any 
one  made  against  secession  was  the  unripeness  of  the  com- 
mon people.  Not  one  flash  of  loyalty  to  the  Central  Gov- 
ernment.    Their  intent  was  to  create  an  oligarchy." 

Why  should  there  have  been  a  flash  of  loyalty  to  the  Cen- 
tral Government?  No  party  in  America  at  that  time  thought  that 
more  loyalty  was  due  to  the  Union  Government  than  to  the  State 
Governments.  This  doctrine  was  never  declared  until  Lin- 
coln inaugurated  war  on  the  South,  on  the  pretext  that  she  was 
disloyal  to  the  Union.  L^p  to  the  very  hour  of  that  war  Lin- 
coln's own  party  held  that  the  South  had  the  right  to  secede,  the 
right  to  independence.  Lincoln,  Seward,  Wade  of  Ohio,  Phil- 
ips of  Massachusetts,  and  hosts  of  other  hign  Republican  speak- 
ers had  publicly  declared  the  South's  right  to  secede,  as  will  be 
shown  later  on. 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

New  England's  Effort  to  Secede  in  1812  and  1814  and  1815. 

The  extracts  given  in  tlic  preceding  pages  show  how  anx- 
ious were  New  England  politicians,  preachers  and  newspapers  to 
get  New  England  to  secede  from  the  Union  in  1796,  and  again  in 
1803  and  1804.  We  will  now  show  New  England's  still  greater 
anxiety  to  get  out  of  the  Union  in  181 2,  1814  and  181 5.''  New 
England  selected  this  time  to  secede,  because  the  Union  was  in 


io8  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

the  throes  of  war  with  a  powerful  foe.  Was  this  from  a  desire 
to  do  the  Union  as  much  harm  as  possible?  In  1799,  when  the 
Federahst,  John  Adams,  was  President,  FederaHsts  counseled 
obedience,  honor  and  respect  to  "rulers."  When  Democrats 
were  in  office  their  tune  was  changfed.  We  will  first  gfive  extracts 
from  the  sermons  of  that  time,  to  show  the  spirit  of  the  people. 
The  Rev.  Dr.  Parish,  of  Boston,  a  divine  of  hig^h  standing  and 
influence,  in  17QQ  instructed  his  cong^resfation  to  hold  their  mag- 
istrates in  "reverence,  honor  and  obedience."  even  to  the  extent 
of  using-  for  them  the  sword.  "Cursed,"  said  this  divine,  "is 
he  that  keepeth  back  his  sword  from  Ijlood.  and  he  that  hath 
none,  let  him  sell  Iris  coat  and  buy  one."  In  a  sermon  delivered 
April  7,  1814.  at  Ryefield,  INIass.,  the  Reverend  Parish  felt  and 
talked  in  a  very  different  strain.  The  Government  was  then  at 
war  with  Great  Britain,  and  New  England,  through  newspapers, 
politicians  and  from  pulpits,  denounced  Government  officials  as 
a  band  of  ruffiians,  and  held  up  Old  England  as  the  most  beneficent 
country  that  ever  was. 

The  Reverend  Parish  said  in  a  sermon : 

"No  peace  will  be  made  until  the  people  sa}'  there  shall 
be  no  war.  War  will  continue  till  the  mountains  are  melted 
in  blood,  till  every  field  in  America  is  white  with  the  bones 
of  her  people." 

In  another  sermon  at  Ryefield  he  discoursed  as  follows : 

"The  Israelites  became  weary  of  yielding  the  fruit  of 
their  labor  to  pamper  their  splendid  tyrants.  Where  is  our 
Moses?  Where  is  the  rod  of  his  miracles?  Where  is  our 
Aaron  ?  Alas !  No  voice  comes  from  the  burning  bush. 
Such  is  the  temper  of  American  Republicans  (Democrats  at 
that  time  were  called  Republicans).  A  new  language  must 
be  invented  before  we  can  attempt  to  express  the  baseness  of 
their  conduct  or  describe  the  rottenness  of  their  hearts.  Do 
you  not  owe  it  to  your  children,  owe  it  to  your  God,  to  make 
peace  for  yourselves  ?  You  may  as  well  expect  the  cataract 
of  Niagara  to  turn  its  current  to  the  head  of  Superior  as  a 
wicked  Congress  to  make  pause  in  the  work  of  destroying 
this  country.  Tyrants  are  the  same  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile 
and  the  Potomac,  at  Memphis  and  at  Washington,  in  a  Mon- 
archy or  in  a  Republic  ;  like  the  worshippers  of  Moloch,  the 
supporters  of  this  vile  administration  sacrifice  their  children 
on  the  altar  of  Democracy.  Tlie  full  vials  of  (lcs])()tism  are 
poured  out  on  your  heads,  and  yet  you  may  challenge  the 


CiiAi'.    1 8  Facts  axd  Falsehoods. 


109 


plodding  Israelite,  tjie  stu])iil  African,  the  feeble  Chinese, 
the  drowsy  Turk,  or  the  frozen  exiles  of  Siberia  to  equal 
you  in  tame  submission  to  the  powers  that  be." 

The  reader's  attention  is  especially  called  to  two  words  in 
the  above  extract ;  words  of  the  deepest  signiticance.  "Stupid 
Africans."  These  word.^  are  something  to  ])onder  over.  "Stupid 
Africa)is."  L'p  to  that  time,  1814,  and  for  years  after,  the  Fed- 
eral party  had  no  respect  and  no  love  for  negroes.  New  England 
men  had  imported  negroes  from  Africa,  consequently  knew  some- 
thing of  negro  nature.  At  that  time  they  had  no  more  idea  of 
setting  the  African  on  a  pinnacle  high  above  the  Caucasian  than 
of  putting  the  "feeble  Chinese"  thereon.  All  through  the  years 
from  1796  up  to  the  year  the  Rev.  Parish  preached  his  sermon 
( 1814)  calling  negroes  "stupid  Africans,"  the  Federal  party  held 
negroes  as  inferior  to  the  white  race.  In  one  of  his  sermons  this 
eager  secession  preacher  said  : 

"Here  we  must  trample  on  the  mandates  of  despotism, 
or  here  we  must  remain  slaves  forever.  Has  not  New  England 
as  much  to  apprehend  as  the  sons  of  Jacob  had?  Let  every 
man  who  sanctions  this  war  remember  he  is  covering  himself 
and  his  country  with  blood  ;  the  blood  of  the  slain  will  cry 
out  from  the  ground  against  him.  This  war  not  only  toler- 
ates crimes,  but  calls  for  crimes — crimes  are  the  food  of  its 
life,  the  arms  of  its  strength.  This  war  is  a  monster  which 
every  hour  gormandizes  a  thousand  crimes,  and  yet  cries  give  ! 
give !  The  first  moment  the  Dragon  moved,  piracy  and  mur- 
der were  legalized.  Those  Western  States  which  have  been 
violent  for  this  abominable  war  of  murder,  God  has  given 
them  blood  to  drink.  Their  men  have  fallen  ;  their  lament- 
ations are  deep  and  loud." 

These   extracts    from   sermons   are   taken    from    Carpenter's 
Logic  of  History,  pages  37,  38,  39. 

A  sermon  delivered  in  Trinity  Church,  Boston,  by  the  Rev. 
F.  F.  Gardiner,  rector,  April  9,  1812,  contains  this: 

"England  is  willing  to  sacrifice  everything  to  conciliate 
us,  except  her  honor  and  independence.  The  British,  after 
all,  save  us  by  their  convoys  infinitely  more  property  than 
they  deprive  us  of.  \\'here  they  take  one  ship  they  protect 
twenty.  Where  they  commit  one  outrage,  they  do  many  acts 
of  kindness." 

A  discourse   delivered   by    this   same   secessionist   divine   on 
July  23,  1813.  contained  these  passages: 


no  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

"This  is  a  war  unexampled  in  the  history  of  the  world, 
wantonly  proclaimed  on  the  most  frivolous  pretenses  against 
a  nation  from  whose  friendship  we  might  derive  the  most 
signal  advantages. 

"Let  no  consideration,  my  brethren,  deter  you  at  all 
times,  and  in  all  places,  from  execrating  the  present  war. 
It  is  unjust,  foolish,  ruinous. 

"As  Mr.  Madison  had  declared  war,  let  Mr.  Madison 
carry  it  on.  This  Union  has  long  since  been  virtually  dis- 
solved. It  is  full  time  that  this  part  of  the  United  States 
should  take  care  of  itself." 

The  Reverend  Dr.  Osgood,  pastor  of  the  Medford  Church, 
Massachusetts,  in  a  discourse  delivered  April  8th,  iSio,  has  this: 

"The  strong  prepossession  of  so  great  a  proportion  of  my 
fellow-citizens  in  favor  of  a  race  of  demons  (the  people  of 
the  South)  and  against  a  nation  (the  British)  of  more  re- 
ligion, virtue,  good  faith,  generosity,  beneficence,  than  any 
that  now  is  or  ever  has  been  upon  the  face  of  the  earth, 
wrings  my  soul  with  anguish,  and  fills  my  soul  with  appre- 
hensions and  terror  of  the  judgments  of  heaven  upon  this 
sinful  people." 

Think  of  it,  gentle  reader,  this  good  Christian  preacher, 
this  follower  of  the  Merciful  Nazarene,  tells  his  audience  that  his 
soul  is  wrung  with  anguish  and  apprehension  and  terror  of  God's 
judgments  upon  them,  because  they  had  not  all  accepted  the  gos- 
pel of  hate,  and  come  to  believe  that  the  people  of  the  South 
were  a  "race  of  demons,"  and  the  British  the  purest  and  best 
nation  on  the  earth.  In  another  discourse  he  Reverend  David 
Osgood  said : 

"Each  man  who  volunteers  his  services  in  such  a  cause 
(the  war  with  Great  Britain)  or  loans  his  money  for  its  sup- 
port, or  by  his  conversation,  his  writings,  or  in  any  other 
mode  of  influence,  encourages  its  prosecution,  that  man  is  an 
accomplice  in  the  wickedness,  and  loads  his  conscience  with 
the  blackest  crimes,  and  brings  the  guilt  of  blood  upon  his 
soul,  and  in  the  sight  of  God  and  his  law,  he  is  a  murderer." 

On  May  9,  1809,  the  Reverend  Osgood  discoursed  before 
the  Lieutenant  Governor  and  the  Legislature  of  Massachusetts, 
and  preached  resistance  to  the  Union  Government,  as  follows : 

"If  we  would,"  said  this  reverend  disunionist.  "pre- 
serve the  liberties  of  that  struggle  (1776)  so  dearly  purchas- 


Chap.  i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  hi 

ed,  the  call   for  resistance  now  is  as  urgent  as  it  was  for- 
merly against  the  mother  country." 

.The  same  Reverend  Osgood,  June  26.  1812,  in  a  sermon, 
predicted   war   on   the    South.     He   said : 

"If  at  the  present  moment  no  symptoms  of  civil  war  a])- 
pear,  there  certainly  shall  soon,  unless  the  courage  of  the 
war  party  fail  them.  A  civil  was  is  as  certain  as  the  events 
that  happen  to  the  known  laws  and  established  course  of 
nature." 

In  a  sermon  delivered  in  Ryefield,  1814,  Rev.  D.  Parish  had 
this: 

"How  will  the  supporters  of  this  anti-Christian  war  en- 
dure the  sentence.,  endure  their  own  reflection,  endure  the 
fire  that  forever  burns,  the  worm  which  never  dies,  the  Ho- 
sannas  of  Heaven,  while  the  smoke  of  their  torment  ascends 
forever  and  ever?" 

The  following  extracts  from  the  Nez^'  E)i gland  Press  may 
be  found  in  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History,  pages  40,  41  and  42. 

The  Boston  Centinel,  December  10,  1814.  had  this: 

"Those  who  startle  at  the  danger  of  the  separation  tell 
us  the  soil  of  New  England  is  hard  and  sterile,  that  deprived 
of  the  productions  of  the  South,  we  would  soon  become  a 
wretched  race  of  cowherds  and  fishermen.  Do  these  people 
forget  what  energy  can  do  for  a  people?  Have  they  read 
of  Holland?  Holland  threw  off  its  yoke  of  Spain  (our 
\^irginia)  and  its  chapels  became  churches,  its  poor  men's 
cottages  princes'  palaces." 

Was  it  not  the  very  insanity  of  hate  to  liken  the  Presidency 
of  \'irginia's  men.  Washington,  Jefiferson,  Monroe  and  Madison, 
to  the  despotism  Philip  II.  of  Spain  wielded  over  Holland?  Fed- 
eralists called  these  four  men's  election  to  ofifice  the  "Virginia 
Dynasty,"  and  ramped  and  raged  over  their  Presidency  as  the 
crudest  despotism. 

It  is  said  that  to  make  a  treaty  of  commerce  with  the 
enemy  is  to  violate  the  Constitution  and  to  sever  the  Union. 
Are  these  not  already  virtually  destroyed? — Boston  Centinel,  • 
Ditc.  14.  1814. 

On  December  15,  1814.  the  Centinel  had  this: 

"By  a  commercial  treaty  with  England,  which  shall 
provide   for  the  i.dmission  of  such   States  as  mav  wish  to 


112  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

come  into  it,  and  which  shall  prohibit  England  from  making 
a  treaty  with  the  South  or  West,  our  commerce  will  be  se- 
cured to  us,  our  standing  in  the  Nation  raised  to  its  proper 
level,  and  New  England's  feelings  will  no  longer  be  sport- 
ed wMth  or  her  interests  violated." 

And  this  while  the  Union  Government  was  at  war  with  Old 
England.  This  wdiile  the  men  of  the  South  were  bravely  doing 
all  they  could  by  their  valor  in  the  army  and  their  money  to  aid 
the  Government  in  its  struggle  with  a  powerful  foe. 

Though  prohibited  by  acts  of  Congress,  all  during  this  coun- 
try's war  with  Old  England,  New  England  carried  on  with  the 
enemy  illicit  intercourse. 

The  moment  our  government  gunboats  w^ere  out  of  Boston 
harbor,  British  merchatnmen,  continually  hovering  about  the 
coast,  would  come  in,  deliver  their  contraband  cargo,  receive 
specie  and  British  bills  of  exchange,  and  return  for  another  car- 
go. If  States  could  blush,  New  England's  face,  even  to  this  day. 
would  burn  with  shame  at  the  false,  the  treacherous  part,  she 
played  during  the  second  war  wath  Great  Britain. 

The  Boston  Cciifiiicl,  December  7,  1814,  had  this: 

"If  we  oppose  them  (the  administration)  with  a  high- 
minded  and  steady  conduct,  who  shall  say  we  shall  not  beat 
them  all?  Why  this  delay?  (Delay  of  making  a  separate 
peace  with  Old  England  and  seceding  from  the  Union.) 
Why  leave  that  to  chance  which  our  firmness  should  com- 
mand? Let  no  difficulties  stay  our  course,  no  danger  draw 
us  back.  We  are  convinced  the  time  has  come  when  Massa- 
chusetts must  make  a  resolute  stand.  The  sentiment  is  hour- 
ly extending,  and  in  the  Northern  States  will  soon  be  uni- 
versal, that  with  respect  to  the  South  we  are  in  the  condi- 
tion of  a  conquered  people." 

New  England  had  been  conquered  at  the  polls.  Democracy 
iiad  won  by  ballots  the  victory  over  Federalism.  This  was  the 
conquest  New  England  men  rankled  and  raged  over.  On  Janua- 
ry 10,  1814.  Deerfield,  Massachusetts,  sent  a  petition,  numer- 
ously signed,  to  the  State  authorities,  from  which  we  take  the 
•following  extract : 

"Should   the  present   administration,   with    the   aid   and 
adherence  of  the  Southern  States,  still  persist  in  the  prosecu- 
tion of  this  wicked  war,  and  in  unconstitutionally  creating 
•    new  States  in  the  mud  of  Louisiana,  he  inhabiants  of  which 


Chap.   i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  113 

country  are  as  ignorant  as  the  alligators  of  its  swamps,  in 
opposition  to  the  rights  and  privileges  of  New  England, 
much  as  we  deprecate  a  separation  of  this  Union,  we  deem 
it  an  evil  much  less  to  be  dreaded  than  co-operation  with 
them  in  their  nefarious  projects." 

What  rights  and  privileges  had  New  England  over  and 
above  the  rights  and  privileges  of  other  States?  The  word 
privilege  is  out  of  place  under  a  free  and  equal  government. 
The  Federalists  of  New  England  fancied  themselves  more  fit  to 
govern  than  Democrats.  They  fancied  the  privilege  of  Rule 
was  theirs  by  right  divine.  The  love  of  power  and  high  place 
was  the  very  passion  of  the  Federal  soul. 

In  Crisis  No.  3    we  find  this : 

"The  public  welfare  will  be  better  promoted  in  a  sep- 
arate than  in  one  Federal  Constitution.  The  attempt  to 
unite  this  vast  territory  under  one  head  is  absurd." — Logic 
of  History. 

The  Federal  Republican,  1814.  asked  this  question: 

"Is  there  now  the  least  foundation  to  build  a  hope  on  that 
this  Union  will  last  twelve  months?  A  peaceable  separa- 
tion will  be  for  the  happiness  of  all  sections."  . 

In  an  Ipswich,  Massachusetts,  memorial,  September  18, 
[813,  we  find  this: 

"iTie  Government  of  these  States  has  almost  completed 
their  ruin.  The  time  has  arrived  when  Massachusetts 
must  make  a  resolute  stand.  What  shall  we  do  to  be  saved? 
Only  one  thing.  The  people  must  rise  in  their  majesty  and 
compel  their  unworthy  servants  to  obey  their  will.  The 
Union  is  already  practically  dissolved." 

The  Boston  Ccntincl.  September   10,   1814,  liad  this: 

"The  Union  of  the  Northern  and  Southern  States  is 
very  much  opposed  to  the  interests  of  both  sections.  The 
extent  of  territory  is  too  large  to  be  governed  by  the  same 
representative  body.  Each  section  will  be  better  satisfied 
to  govern  itself.  Each  is  large  and  populous  enough  for 
its  own  protection.  The  Western  States  will  govern  them- 
selves better  than  the  Atlantic  can  govern  them.  It  is  cer- 
tain that  the  Atlantic  States  do  not  want  the  aid  or  counsel 
of  the  Western  States.     The  public  welfare  would  be  more 


114  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

promoted  in  a  separate  than  in  a  Federal  Constitution." 

This  was  true  then  and  is  true  now. 

"The  sufferings  so  thick  about  us  have  aroused  New 
England.  She  will  now  meet  every  danger  until  her  rights 
are  returned  to  the  full.  She  will  say  to  the  men  of  New 
England,  if  they  hope  to  lead  in  the  cause  of  New  England's 
independence,  they  must  do  it  in  the  spirit  of  New  England 
men." — Boston  Centincl,  December  7,  1814. 
The  Boston  Advertiser,  1814,  said: 

"Our  plan  is  to  withhold  our  money  and  make  a  sepa- 
rate peace  with  Great  Britain." 

The  Federal  Republican,   1814,  had  this: 

"The  Eastern  States  are  marching  steadily  and  straight 
forward  up  to  revolution.  In  times  past  there  was  much 
talk  and  loud  menace,  but  little  acting,  among  the  friends 
of  reform  (secession  from  the  Union).  Now  little  is  said 
and  much  done.  The  new  constitution  of  the  Hartford 
convention  is  to  go  into  operation  as  soon  as  two  or  three 
States  shall  have  adopted  it." 

On  January  5,  181 5,  at  a  meeting  held  at  Reading.  Massa- 
chusetts, a  string  of  resolutions  was  passed,  one  of  which  is  as 
follows : 

"Resolved,  That  we  place  the  fullest  confidence  in  the 
Government  and  Legislature  of  Massachusetts,  and  in  the 
State  authorities  of  New  England,  and  to  them,  under  God, 
we  look  for  aid  and  direction." 

These  Federalists,  as  was  their  offspring,  the  Republican 
party,  were  strong  Statf^s'  riglits  advocates  rp  to  tl"'c  hour  the 
war  begun  at  Fort  Sumter.  Then  they  made  a  sudden  sum- 
mersault, and  declared  States'  rights  and  secession  unpardonable 
crimes  resulting  from  leprosy  of  the  mind  as  foul  as  leprosy  of 
the  body. 

The  Boston  Repertory,  1814,  was  so  eager  for  New  England 
to  leave  the  Union,  and  so  full  of  the  idea  that  there  would  be 
a  war  with  the  South,  it  addressed  the  people  of  New  England 
with  an  air  of  command : 

"Americans !"  cried  out  the  Repertory,  "prepare   your 
arms!     You  will  soon  be  called  to  use  them!" 
The  New  York  Commercial  Advertiser  had  this: 


OrAP.   1 8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  115 

"Old  Massachusetts  is  as  terrible  to  the  Americans  now 
as  she  was  to  the  British  Cabinet  in  1775.  America  has  her 
Biites  and  her  Norths.  Let  the  commercial  .States  breast 
themselves  to  the  shock.  Then,  and  not  till  then,  shall  they 
humble  the  pride  of  Virginia  and  chastise  the  insolence  of 
the  madmen  of  Kentucky  and  Tennessee,  who  aspire  to  the 
Government  of  these  States." 

January  31,  1814,  the  citizens  of  Newburyport,  Massachu- 
setts, sent  a  memorial  to  the  Legislature  of  Massachusetts,  from 
which  we  get  this  extract : 

"Our  unquestionable  rights  are  invaded.  We  call  upon 
our  State  Legislature  to  protect  us  in  our  privileges,  to  de- 
fend which  we  are  ready  to  resist  unto  blood.  We  are  ready 
to  aid  you  to  our  utmost  power  in  securing  our  privileges, 
peacefully  if  we  can,  forcibly  if  we  must ;  and  we  pledge 
ourselves  in  support  of  every  measure  the  dignity  and  liber- 
ties of  this  free,  sovereign  and  independent  State  may  seem 
to  your  wisdom  to  demand." 

The  only  complaint  these  men  had  against  the  Government 
was,  it  was  waging  war  with  Great  Britain. 

The  Federal  Republican.  November  7,  18 14.  put  forth  this 
terrible  threat : 

"On  or  before  the  4th  of  July,  if  James  Madison  is  not 
out  of  office,  a  new  form  of  government  will  be  in  operation 
in  the  Eastern  section  of  the  LTnion ;  the  contest  then  will  be 
whether  to  adhere  to  the  old  or  join  the  new  government." 

From  an  open  letter  to  James  Madison,  published  and  large- 
ly circulated  through  New  York  and  New  England,  in  May,  1814, 
titled  "Northern  Grievances,"  we  give  the  following: 

"If  the  impending  negotiations  with  Great  Britain  are 
defeated  ;  if  the  friendly  and  conciliatory  proposals  of  the 
enemy  should  be  met  so  as  not  to  terminate  this  infamous 
war,  it  is  necessary  to  apprise  you  (President  Madison)  that 
such  conduct  will  be  no  longer  borne.  The  injured  States 
of  New  England  will  be  compelled  by  duty  and  honor  to  dash 
into  atoms  the  bonds  of  tyranny.  It  will  then  be  too  late  to 
retreat ;  the  die  will  be  cast ;  freedom  purchased.  A  separa- 
tion of  the  States  will  be  inevitable.  Motives  numerous  and 
urgent  will  demand  this  measure.  The  oppressors  will  be 
responsible  for  the  momentous  events  arising  from  the  dis- 
solution of  the  Union.     It   will  be   their  work.     Posterity 


ii6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

will  admire  the  independent  spirit  of  the  Eastern  section  of 
our  country,  and  will  enjoy  the  fruits  of  our  firmness  and 
our  wisdom.  The  descendants  of  the  South  and  West  will 
have  reason  to  curse  the  folly  of  your  counsels.  Bold  and 
resolute  in  the  sacred  object,  no  force  can  withstand  our 
powerful  arms.  The  most  numerous  army  will  melt  before 
our  manlv  streng^th.  History  will  instruct  you  that  the  feeble 
debility  of  the  South  could  never  face  the  vigorous  activity 
of  the  North.  A  single  spark  of  Northern  liberty  will  ex- 
plode the  whole  atmosphere  of  sultry  Southern  despotism. 
Do  vou  imagine  the  energy  of  the  Northern  freemen  is 
to  be  smothered?" 

No  human  was  trying  to  smother  their  energies.  On  the 
contrary,  Mr.  Madison  would  have  been  delighted  had  those 
Northern  freemen  put  some  of  their  energy  into  the  war  against 
Great  Britain,  instead  of  doing  all  they  could  to  give  aid  and  com- 
fort to  the  enemy. 

"Do  you  think,"  continued  this  curious  letter,  "that  we 
will  allow  ourselves  to  be  trampled  on  ?  and  by  whom  ?  The 
Southern  and  Western  States  ?" 

History  does  not  show  the  slightest  sign  of  any  effort  or  wish 
of  the  Southern  and  Western  States  to  trample  on  New  England. 

"The  aggregate  strength,"  continues- the  letter,  "of  the 
South  and  West,  if  brought  against  the  North  and  East,  would 
be  driven  into  the  ocean  or  back  to  their  own  wilds,  and  they 
might  think  themselves  fortunate  to  escape  other  punishment 
We  would  fight  for  freedom,  they  to  enslave.  Beware ! 
Pause !  before  you  take  the  fatal  plunge.  You,  sir,  have  car- 
ried your  oppression  to  the  utmost  stretch.  We  will  no 
longer  submit.  Name  an  immediate  peace.  Protect  our 
seamen.  Unless  you  comply  with  these  just  demands  with- 
out delay,  ivc  zvill  withdrazv  from  the  Union." 

Oh.  would  to  God  New  England  then  and  there  had  with- 
drawn from  the  Union !  It  would  have  been  a  bloodless  with- 
drawal. Madison  and  Monroe  had  both  expressed  the  opinion 
that  to  coerce  a  seceding  State  would  be  suicidal  to  freedom. 
Legal  divcice  irou)  the  Slates  New  England  had  so  long  hated 
might  have  abated  somewhat  the  insanity  of  that  hate.  Juster, 
kinder  feelings  might  ha\e  softened  her  heart  toward  a  people 
who  certainly  had  not  given  New  England  cause  to  hate.  Had 
separation  then  taken  place  the  Northern  people  might  not  have 


Chap.  i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  117 

aided  and  abetted  the  Republican  party  in  committing  the  awful 
crime  of  drenching  American  soil  with  brothers'  blood.  Had 
New  England  States  then  seceded,  no  blood  would  have  been  shed 
to  force  them  back  into  a  Union  she  detested.  Every  Democrat 
in  America  knew  and  knows  that  the  Union  Government  had 
and  has  no  moral  or  legal  right  to  coerce  seceding  States.  Such 
was  then  the  opinion,  both  North  and  South.  In  the  convention 
of  1787  the  question  of  secession  and  coercion  was  up  for  dis- 
cussion.    Madison  said : 

"A  Union  of  States  with  such  an  ingredient  as  coercion 
would  seem  to  provide  for  its  own  destruction." 

It  certainly  would  provide  for  the  destruction  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  liberty  itself.  Looked  at  by  the  lurid  light  of  the  60s, 
one  expression  in  the  above  letter  to  President  Madison  will 
make  the  reader  pause  and  reflect  a  moment.  The  "feeble  debil- 
ity of  the  South  could  never  face  the  vigorous  activity  of  the\ 
North." 

The  Republican  party  had  inherited  from  its  progenitor,  the 
Federal,  the  above  idea  of  the  South's  feeble  debility.  Members 
of  that  party  invited  United  States  Senators  and  Congressmen 
to  take  their  wives  and  daughters  out  to  see  the  first  fight  of  the 
war,  especially  to  "see  the  rebels  run  at  sight  of  Union  soldiers." 
Everybody  knows  how  the  rebels  ran  at  Bull  Run. 

Republican  officers  of  the  Union  army  have  expressed  their 
opinion  of  the  South's  "feeble  debility."  General  Don  Piatt,  a 
Union  officer,  on  this  subject  has  this: 

"The  true  story  of  the  late  war,"  wrote  General  Piatt, 
in  1887,  "has  not  yet  been  told.  It  probably  never  will  be 
told.  It  is  not  flattering  to  our  people ;  unpalatable  truths 
seldom  find  their  way  into  history.  How  rebels  fought  the 
world  will  never  know ;  for  two  years  they  kept  an  army 
in  the  field  that  girt  their  borders  with  a  fire  that  shriveled 
our  forces  as  they  marched  in,  like  tissue  paper  in  a  flame. 
Southern  people  were  animated  by  a  feeling  that  the  word 
fanaticism  feebly  expresses.  (Love  of  liberty  expresses  it.) 
For  two  years  this  feeling  held  those  rebels  to  a  conflict  in 
which  they  were  invincible.  The  North  poured  out  its  noble 
soldiery  by  the  thousands,  and  they  fought  well,  but  their 
broken  columns  and  thinned  lines  drifted  back  upon  our 
capital,  with  nothing  but  shameful  disasters  to  tell  of  the 
dead,  the  dying,  the  lost  colors  and  the  captured  artillery. 
Grant's  road  from  the  Rapidan  to  Richmond  was  marked 


ii8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

by  a  highway  of  human  bones.     The  Northern  army  had 
more  killed  than  the  Confederate  Generals  had  in  command." 

"We  can  lose  five  men  to  their  one  and  win,"  said  Grant. 
The  men  of  the  South,  half  starved,  unsheltered,  in  rags,  shoe- 
less, yet  Grant's  marches  from  the  Rapidan  to  Richmond  left 
dead  behind  him  more  men  than  the  Confederates  had  in  the 
field ! 

General  Piatt  speaks  as  follows  of  the  "feeble  debility"  of  a 
Virginian  General  : 

"It  is  strange,"  says  Piatt,  "what  magic  lingers  about 
the  mouldering  remains  of  Virginia's  rebel  leaders.  Lee's 
very  name  confers  renown  on  his  enemies.  The  shadow  of 
Lee's  surrendered  sword  gives  renown  to  an  otherwise  un- 
known grave."     (Grant's.) 

The  Reverend  H.  W.  Beecher  preached  a  sermon  in  his 
church  on  the  "Price  of  Liberty,"  which  he  said  was  not  only  eter- 
nal vigilance,  but  eternal  self-sacrifice.  Beecher  astonished  his 
congregation  by  illustrations  from  the  South. 

"Where,"  exclaimed  the  preacher,  "shall  we  find  such 
heroic  self-denial,  such  upbearing  under  every  physical  dis- 
comfort, such  patience  in  poverty,  in  distress,  in  absolute 
want,  as  we  find  in  the  Southern  army?  They  fight  better 
in  a  bad  cause  than  you  do  in  a  good  one ;  they  fight  better 
for  a  passion  than  you  do  for  a  sentiment.  They  fight  well 
and  bear  up  under  trouble  nobly,  they  suffer  and  never  com- 
plain, they  go  in  rags  and  never  rebel,  they  are  in  earnest  for 
their  liberty,  they  believe  in  it,  and  if  they  can  they  mean 
to  get  it." 

What  words  can  express  the  baseness,  the  devilish  wicked- 
ness of  a  party  which  waged  a  bloody  war  to  rob  such  people  of 
the  liberty  which  was  theirs  by  right?  Theirs  by  inheritance 
from  their  forefathers  of  '76? 

The  Republican  leaders  of  the  60s  were  as  ignorant  of  the 
nature  of  Southern  men  as  were  their  progenitors  who  talked 
of  the  "South's  feeble  debility."  Piatt  relates  an  interview  he 
had  with  Lincoln  before  the  outbreak  of  the  war, 

"Lincoln's  low  estimate  of  humanity,"  says  Piatt,  "blind- 
ed him  to  the  South.  He  could  not  undertsand  that  men 
would  fight  for  an  idea.  He  thought  the  South's  movement 
a  sort  of  political  game  of  bluflF." 


Chap.  i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  119 

"The   South  can't  fight,"   said  one;   "she   has   no   re- 


sources." 


Hannibal  Hamhn  said : 

"The  South  will  have  to  come  to  us  for  arms,  and  come 
without  money  to  pay  for  them." 

"And  for  coffins,"  said  John  P.  Hale,  with  a  laugh. 

"To  put  a  regiment  in  the  field,"  said  Mr.  Speaker 
Banks,  "costs  more  than  the  entire  income  of  an  entire 
Southern  State." 

It  was  not  long  before  the  men  of  the  North  found  that  the 
South's  soldiers  supplied  themselves  with  arms  and  clothing  capt- 
ured from  Union  soldiers. 

Extracts  from  an  address  to  the  Hartford  convention : 
"The  once  venerable  Constitution  has  expired  by  disso- 
lution in  the  hands  of  the  wicked  men  (Democrats)  who  were 
sworn  to  protect  it.  Its  spirit,  with  the  precious  souls  of  its 
first  founders,  has  fled  forever.  Its  remains  will  now  rest 
in  the  silent  tomb.  At  your  hands,  therefore,  we  demand 
deliverance.  New  England  is  unanimous,  and  we  announce 
our  irrevocable  decree  that  the  tyrannical  oppression  of  those 
who  at  present  usurp  the  power  of  the  Constitution  is  be- 
yond endurance,  and  we  will  resist  it." — Boston  Centinel, 
December  28,  1814. 

"New  England  will  look  with  an  eye  of  doubt  on  those 
who  oppose  us.  She  will  meet  every  danger  and  go  through 
every  difficulty,  until  her  rights  are  restored.  Throwing  ofif  all 
connection  with  this  wasteful  war  and  making  peace  with 
the  enemy  would  be  a  wise  and  manly  course." — Boston  Cen- 
tinel, December  17,  1814. 

Extracts  from  a  memorial  of  the  citizens  of  Newburyport 
to  the  Legislature  of  Massachusetts,  January  31,  1814: 

"Is  there  a  Federalist  patriot  in  America  who  thinks 
it  is  his  duty  to  shed  his  blood  for  Madison,  for  Jefferson, 
and  the  host  of  ruffians  in  Congress  who  have  set  their 
faces  against  us  for  years,  and  spirited  up  the  brutal  part  of 
the  populace  to  destroy  us?  Mr.  Madison  cannot  complete 
his  term  of  service  if  this  war  continues ;  it  is  not  possible. 
Mr.  Madison  may  rest  assured  there  is  in  the  hearts  of  many 
thousands  in  this  abused,  ruined  country  a  sentiment  and 
energy  to  resist  unto  destruction  when  his  mad  men  shall 
call  it  into  action." 


I20  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

The  following  extract  from  an  address  to  the  Hartford  con- 
vention, December  24,  1814,  will  show  the  feeling  of  the  Federal 
disimionists  toward  white  people  of  the  South,  as  well  as  toward 
the  negroes : 

"Long  enough,"  says  this  address,  "have  we  paid  taxes 
and  fought  the  battles  for  the  Southern  States ;  long  enough 
have  we  been  scouted  and  abused  by  men  who  claim  a  right 
to  rule  us ;  long  enough  have  we  been  slaves  to  the  senseless 
representatives  of  the  South,  the  equally  senseless  natives  of 
Africa,  and  the  barbarous  huntsmen  of  the  Western  wilder- 
ness. Realities  alone  can  work  our  deliverance,  and  deliver- 
ance we  solemnly  and  irrevocably  decree  to  be  our  right  and 
we  will  obtain  it." — Boston  Centinel,  December  24,  1814. 

The  reader  will  note  the  significant  phrase,  "equally  senseless 
natives  of  Africa."  A  few  years  from  that  time  New  England 
placed  negroes  on  a  tall  pinnacle  and  put  saintly  aureoles  around 
their  heads,  and  all  good  Republicans  did  them  homage.  On  the 
8th  of  October,  1814,  a  committee  of  the  Massachusetts  Legisla- 
ture submitted  a  report  by  Mr.  Otis,  chairman,  in  favor  of  calling 
a  convention  for  all  the  New  England  States  with  the  object  of 
forming  a  Northeastern  Confederacy.  The  result  was  the  Hart- 
ford convention,  which  met  December  15,  1814.  This  convention, 
as  we  have  shown  by  extracts,  took  the  strongest  possible  stand 
for  States'  rights.  In  a  report  this  convention  enunciated  its 
opinion  of  States'  rights  in  these  words : 

"It  is  not  only  the  right,  but  the  duty,  of  each  State  to  in- 
terpose its  authority  in  the  manner  best  calculated  to  secure 
its  own  protection.  States  must  be  their  own  judges  and  ex- 
ecute their  own  decisions." 

New  England,  during  the  second  war  with  Great  Britain, 
acted  boldly  and  openly  on  States'  rights  prmciples.  She  refused 
to  aid  and  support  the  Union.  Her  preachers,  press  and  politi- 
cians praised  the  English  and  in  every  way  manifested  a  friendly 
leel'iig  toward  Old  England,  all  the  while  abusing  their  own  Gov- 
ernment as  managed  by  a  "gang  of  ruffians."  February  14,  1814, 
the  two  Houses  of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  put  forth  a  re- 
port in  which  is  this  solemn  declaration: 

"The  question  of  New  England's  withdrawal  from  the 
Union  is  not  a  question  of  power  or  of  right  to  separate,  but 
only  a  question  of  time  and  expediency." 


Chap.  i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  121 

A  few  years  later  Massachusetts  called  such  doctrines  black- 
est treason,  and  sent  armies  on  the  Southern  people  to  kill,  con- 
quer or  annihilate  them  for  having  acted  on  those  doctrines. 

The  doctrine  of  States'  rights  was  taught  by  politicians,  press 
and  preachers  of  New  England  up  to  the  very  hour  the  South 
seceded.  This  fact  is  indisputable.  Not  until  Lincoln  began  war 
on  the  South  were  secession  and  States'  rights  called  a  political 
crime.     The  Olive  Branch  (1814)  said: 

"Massachusetts  has  dared  the  national  Government  to 
conflict.  She  has  seized  it  by  the  throat,  determined  to  stran- 
gle it  if  she  can." 

A  committee  of  the  New  York  Legislature  (1814)  made  the 
following  statement : 

"It  is  the  opinion  of  this  committee  that  the  New 
England  Federalists  mean  to  make  peace  with  the  enemy  and 
to  forcibly  separate  New  England  from  the  Union." 

So  universal  was  this  opinion,  on  the  nth  of  October,  1814. 
thirteen  Democratic  Senators  and  thirty-five  Congressmen  issued 
a  strong  but  kindly  worded  protest  against  New  England's  dis- 
union movements,  to  which  one  of  New  England's  Federal  leaders 
angrily  replied : 

"Do  you  imagine  that  we  will  allow  ourselves  to  be  tram- 
pled on  by  the  South  and  West?" 

The  only  shadow  of  being  trampled  on  was  the  fact  that  the 
Democrats  of  the  South  and  West  had  elected  Democrats  to  the 
national  offices,  and  the  South  and  West  approved  of  the  war  then 
going  on  with  Great  Britain,  and  gave  the  administration  all  the 
moral  and  financial  support  they  could,  opposed  to  the  wishes  of 
New  England. 

A  speaker  in  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  in  1814  made  the 
following  solemn  declaration: 

"The  Constitution  has  expired  by  dissolution.  The 
Union  Government  is  beyond  endurance ;  we  will  resist.  New 
England  will  bear  no  half  way  measures.  She  wants  men 
who  will  lead  the  cause  of  New  England  independence." 

An  address  delivered  in  the  Hartford  convention  rehearses 
the  wrongs  it  was  claimed  that  New  England  suflfered  which  ne- 
cessitated secession  from  the  Union : 

"They,"  the  said  wrongs,  "may  be  traced  to  implacable 
combinations  of  individuals  and  States  to  monopolize  power 
and  office,  and  to  trample  without  remorse  on  the  rights  and 


122  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

interests  of  the  commercial  section  of  the  Union." 

Because  of  these  fancied  wrongs  New  England  hated  Demo- 
crats, hated  the  South,  hated  the  Union,  was  eager  to  leave  it, 
and  fiercely  wanted  to  war  on  the  Southern  people.  Up  to  that 
hour  not  one  particle  of  anti-slavery  sentiment  was  mingled  with 
New  England's  animosity,  or  with  her  desire  to  secede  from  the 
Union.  Up  to  the  year  1815,  with  New  England's  insane  hatred 
of  the  Southern  whites,  she  had  not  yet  mixed  an  insane  love  for 
Southern  blacks.  Up  to  that  year  New  England's  political 
speakers,  press  and  preachers,  when  referring  to  negroes,  called 
them  "stupid  Africans."  "senseless  blacks,"  or  other  names  con- 
veying contempt  and  belief  in  negro  inferiority. 

In  his  work,  "Nullification  and  Secession,"  E.  P.  Powell  says : 

"It  is  very  partial  partisan  reading  of  American  history 
not  to  see  that  from  the  acceptance  of  the  Constitution  in  1790 
there  has  been  a  tendency  to  assert  the  rights  of  States,  and 
the  rights  of  States  to  sever  relation  to  the  Union.  New 
England,  in  1803-04,  tried  to  get  five  States  to  secede,  New 
York,  New  Jersey  and  the  New  England  States.  In  181 2- 14 
New  England  practically  withdrew  from  co-operation  with 
the  Union." 

Mr.  E.  P.  Powell,  of  New  York,  wrote  "Nullification  and  Se- 
cession" in  1897,  thirty-two  years  after  the  war  of  conquest  on 
the  South.  A  conquest  which,  as  Mr.  Powell  knows,  was  made 
by  the  Republican  party  on  pretense  that  that  party  looked  on  se- 
cession as  the  most  damnable  crime  a  people  can  commit.  Was 
Mr.  Powell  afraid  to  tell  the  whole  truth  about  the  secession  prin^ 
ciples  held  and  taught  by  the  Republican  party  and  its  progenitors, 
the  Federals?     Mr.  Powell  timidly  says: 

"From  1790  there  has  been  a  tendency  to  assert  States* 
rights,  and  the  right  of  the  States  to  sever  relation  to  the 
Union." 

The  word  tendency  means  an  inclination,  a  leaning,  a  drift 
in  one  or  another  direction.  Did  not  Mr.  Powell  know  that  the 
Federal  party,  almost  from  the  formation  of  the  Union,  had  been 
dissatisfied  with  it  ?  He  certainly  knew,  as  he  shows  in  his  work, 
"Nullification  and  Secession,"  that  this  party  not  only  had  a  "ten- 
dency"  toward  States'  rights  and  secession  in  1804  and  on  to 
the  end  of  the  second  war  with  Great  Britain,  but  a  decided  inten- 
tion and  determination  to  get  the  Northeastern  States  to  secede 
and  to  form  a  Northeastern  Confederacy.     Mr.   Powell  knows 


Chap.   i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  '  123 

how  hard  the  men  of  New  England  worked  for  secession,  and  how 
boldly  they  avowed  and  maintained  the  doctrine  of  States'  rights. 
Is  it  possible  that  he  does  not  also  know  that  the  Republican  party 
continued  the  work  of  the  Federals  in  that  direction  up  to  the 
very  hour  of  the  South's  secession?  Does  he  not  further  know 
that  after  the  Republican  party  conquered  the  South  on  the  pre- 
text that  it  (the  Republican  party)  so  loved  the  Union  it  waged  a 
bloody  war  to  save  it,  this  same  Republican  party  now  tries  to 
bury  out  of  sight  its  former  advocacy  of  secession  and  States' 
rights,  and  frowns  severely  on  any  writer  who  dares  to  bring  to 
the  front  that  part  of  its  history?  Was  it  fear  of  Republican 
frowns  that  made  Mr.  Powell  use  the  gentle  word  tendency 
instead  of  the  plain  English  word  advocacy,  and  the  strongest 
sort  of  advocacy  at  that  ? 

S.  D.  Carpenter,  a  close  and  critical  student  of  political 
events,  in  his  invaluable  work.  The  Logic  of  History,  published 
in  1864,  says: 

"The  Northeastern  States  early  sought  to  create  preju- 
dice and  disunion,  not  on  account  of  any  existing  facts,  but  to 
array  section  against  section,  to  stimulate  hatred  and  discord 
for  the  purpose  of  accelerating  their  darling  object,  dissolution 
of  the  Union  and  the  establishment  of  a  Northeastern  Con- 
federacy, For  years  the  disunionists  of  the  North  have  mani- 
fested the  boldness  of  a  Cromwell,  the  assiduity  of  beavers, 
the  cunning  of  a  fox  and  the  malignity  of  Iscariot." 

Do  not  the  extracts  I  have  laid  before  the  reader  show  de- 
termination to  arouse  hatred  of  the  Southern  people  ?  The  reader 
must  never  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  Federal  and  Republican 
hatred  sprung  from  hatred  of  Democracy.  The  Union  was  hated 
because  the  majority  of  men  in  the  Union  elected  too  many  Dem- 
ocratic Presidents.  These  Presidents,  Washington,  Jefferson. 
Monroe  and  Madison,  were  hated  and  called  the  "Virginia  dy- 
nasty." A  New  Englander  was  the  first  man  in  the  American 
Congress  to  threaten  disunion.  January  ii,  181 1,  Josiah  Quincy, 
of  Massachusetts,  from  the  floor  of  Congress  declared: 

"The  purchase  of  Louisiana  and  the  admission  of  that 
State  into  the  Union  would  be  a  virtual  dissolution  of  the 
Union,  rendering  it  the  right  of  all,  as  it  becomes  the  duty  of 
some  men  to  prepare  definitely  for  the  separation  of  the 
States,  amicably  if  they  might,  forcibly  if  they  must." 

Mr.  Quincy  reduced  the  above  to  writing  and  sent  it  to  the 
Clerk  of  the  House. 


124  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     i8 

Mr.  Poindexter  of  Virginia,  sprang  to  his  feet: 

"That,"  he  cried,  "  is  the  first  threat  on  the  floor  of  Con- 
gress to  break  up  the  Union." — Hildreth's  History  of  United 
States,  Vol.  IV.,  page  226. 

In  1 81 3  Mr.  Quincy,  this  same  zealous  secessionist  and  dis- 
unionist,  was  chairman  of  a  committee  in  the  Massachusetts  Legis- 
lature, still  pushing  on  secession  plans.  Mr.  Quincy  offered  the  fol- 
lowing resolution,  which  was  adopted: 

"Resolved,  That  the  act  passed  the  8th  day  of  April,  1812, 
entitled,  'An  Act  for  the  admission  of  the  State  of  Louisiana 
into  the  Union  and  to  extend  the  laws  of  the  United  States 
to  said  State,'  is  a  violation  of  the  United  States  Constitution, 
and  that  the  Senators  of  the  State  of  Massachusetts  be  in- 
structed, and  the  Represenatives  thereof  be  requested  to 
use  their  endeavor  to  obtain  the  repeal  of  the  same." 

Governor  Strong,  of  Massachusetts,  wanted  New  England  to 
secede  from  the  Union,  and  after  secession  schemes  were  stopped 
by  the  glorious  ending  of  the  second  war  with  Great  Britain,  won 
by  Southern  soldiers  under  the  immortal  Jackson,  Governor 
Strong,  to  console  himself  and  his  friends,  said : 

"Even  though  New  England  has  failed  to  break  the 
Union,  the  Western  States  ere  long  of  themselves  will  get 
out  of  the  Union.  We  then  will  be  happy  neighbors,  whereas 
in  a  Union  will  always  be  friction." 

The  reader  may  have  observed  in  some  of  the  foregoing  ex- 
tracts references  made  to  Massachusetts'  jealousy.  Bancroft,  the 
historian,  himself  a  son  of  Massachusetts,  said  of  his  mother 
State : 

"An  ineradical  dread  of  the  coming  power  of  the  South 
and  West  lurked  in  New  England,  especially  in  Massachu- 
setts." 

Jealousy  owes  its  life  to  selfishness ;  it  is  a  mean  quality  of 
which  every  large  mind  is  ashamed ;  when  its  origin  is  generally 
known,  even  those  affected  with  jealousy  will  strive  to  suppress 
or  at  least  hide  it. 

A  sample  of  New  England's  jealousy  in  this  way  may  be 
found  in  Mr.  Rives'  "Life  of  Madison."  Rives  states  that  in  the 
convention  which  framed  the  Constitution,  Mr.  Gouverneur 
Morris,  delegate  from  Pennsylvania,  was  made  spokesman  for 
the  Eastern  States.     Mr.  Morris  said: 


Chap.  i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


125 


"I  look  forward  to  that  range  of  States  which  will  soon 
be  formed  in  the  West.  These  new  States  will  know  less  of 
the  public  interests  than  the  old,  will  have  interests  in  many 
respects  different.  It  must  be  apparent  they  will  not  be 
able  to  furnish  men  equally  as  enlightened  as  the  Eastern 
men  to  share  in  the  administration  of  the  common  interest. 
If  the  Western  States  get  power  in  their  hands  they  will  ruin 
the  Atlantic  States'  interests.  I  think  the  rule  of  representa- 
tion ought  to  be  so  fixed  as  to  secure  to  the  Atlantic  States 
the  prevalence  in  the  national  council.  This  will  provide  a 
defense  to  the  Northeast." 

Mr.  Gouverneur  Morris  never  thought  of  providing  a  de- 
fense of  the  Western  States  against  Eastern  greed  of  power 
and  money.  Mr.  King  and  Mr.  Gerry,  of  Massachusetts,  took 
up  the  subject,  repeating  the  alarm  sounded  by  Mr.  Morris. 
Mr.  Gerry  said : 

"If  the  Western  States  acquire  power  they  will  abuse  it ; 
they  will  draw  our  wealth  into  the  Western  country  and 
oppose  commerce." 

One  of  the  charges  New  England  repeatedly  made  against 
the  South  was  that  she  opposed  commerce.  This  supposed  oppo- 
sition was  used  to  excuse  their  desire  to  secede  from  the  Union 
and  form  a  Northeastern  Confederacy.  These  jealous  and  selfish 
men  submitted  to  the  convention  the  following  proposal : 

"Whatever  may  be  the  future  population  of  the  new 
States  in  the  West,  the  total  number  of  their  representatives 
shall  not  exceed  the  total  number  of  representatives  of  the 
old  States." 

The  men  from  Virginia  firmly  opposed  this  proposition: 
"The  new  States  of  the  West,"  argued  Colonel  Mason, 
of  \^irginia,  "must  be  treated  as  equals  and  subjected  to  no 
degrading  discrimination.  They  will  have  the  same 
.pride  and  other  passions  we  have,  and  will  probably  revolt 
from  the  Union  if  they  are  not  in  all  respects  placed  on  an 
equal  footing  with  the  Eastern  States." 

Mr.  Madison  said: 

"I  am  clear  and  firm  in  the  opinion  that  no  unfavorable 

distinction   should  be   made  between  the   Atlantic   and   the 

Western  States,  either  in  policy  or  justice." 

The  proposition  of  the  Eastern  men  was  put  to  a  vote: 
Yeas — Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  Maryland,  Delaware. 


126  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     19 

Nays — Virginia,  North  and  South  Carolina  and  Georgia. 
Pennsylvania  was  divided. 

Judge,  oh,  you  men  of  the  West !  which  section.  New  England 
or  the  South,  displayed  the  higher  sense  of  justice?  Less  selfish 
greed  for  power?  But  for  the  resistance  of  Virginia's  freedom- 
loving  men.  Mason  and  Madison,  the  limbs  of  the  infant  Her- 
cules of  the  West  would  have  been  so  bound  by  the  men  of  the 
East,  the  West  would  have  been  crippled  and  cramped  for  life, 
or  would  have  broken  its  bonds  asunder  and  by  its  sword  won 
equality. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

Contains  Further  Evidence  Proving  New  England's  Secession 
and    Disunion    Sentiments — Her    Eagerness    to    Sever  the 

Union  in  Tzvain. 

The  extracts  given  in  Chapter  XVIII.  are  mostly  from  S.  D. 
Carpenter's  Logic  of  History;  a  few  are  from  the  Democratic 
Handbook.  As  the  case  of  the  South  versus  the  Republican  party 
will  ere  long  be  taken  into  posterity's  court  for  final  judgment,  I 
trust  the  reader  will  find  the  evidence  bearing  on  this  case  of  suffi- 
cient interest  to  read  the  following  extracts,  taken  from  Mr.  E. 
P.  Powell's  work,  "Nullification  and  Secession :" 

Extracts. 

"When  the  United  States  declared  war  in  1812  against 
Great  Britain  the  Federalists  in  Congress  issued  an  address 
to  the  people  of  New  England  declaring  the  war  needless  and 
unwise.  The  Massachusetts  House  of  Representatives 
promptly  voted  an  address  denouncing  the  war  as  a  wanton 
sacrifice  of  New  England's  interests,  and  calling  for  town 
meetings  to  denounce  the  war.     The  address  to  the  people: 

"  'Let  the  sound  of  your  disapprobation  of  this  war  be 
loud  and  deep  ;  let  there  be  no  volunteers  except  for  defensive 
war.'  " 

"This,"  remarks  Mr.  Powell,  "at  the  very  outset  was 
practical  secession  from  the  Union." 

"Every  possible  hindrance  was  thrown  in  the  way  of 
securing  enlistments  for  the  army.  Those  who  did  enlist  were 
arrested  on  real  or  fictitious  charges  of  debt,  and  the  courts 
cheerfully  insisted  that  'while  a  man  was  debtor  he  was  the 


Chap.   19  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  127 

property  of  the  creditor  and  could  not  be  allowed  to  leave  the 
State.' " 

Governor  Griswald  of  Connecticut  declared  he  did  not  be- 
lieve the  militia  of  that  State  could  be  ordered  to  obey  a  Continen- 
tal officer.  The  Legislature  of  Connecticut  resolved  that  the  con- 
duct of  His  Excellency  the  Governor  in  refusing  to  order  the 
militia  of  this  State  into  the  service  of  the  United  States  on  the 
requisition  of  the  Secretary  of  War,  met  with  the  entire  approba- 
tion of  the  Assembly. 

"The  South  and  West  were  overwhelmingly  loyal  to  the 
Union ;  the  Southern  people  were  devoted  to  the  Union.  The 
Federalists  declared  it  was  capable  of  proof  'that  Madison 
and  Jefferson  were  in  league  with  Napoleon.'  The  clergy 
preached  and  the  politicians  orated  in  the  same  strain.  As 
1 812  drew  toward  a  close  the  condition  of  affairs  was  pitiful. 
Madison  in  his  message  spoke  warmly  of  the  course  taken  by 
New  England,  as  practically  destroying  the  Union ;  instead  of 
one  nation  we  were  acting  as  two  in  the  face  of  the  enemy. 
He  defined  the  war  as  an  expression  of  our  determination  to 
compel  England  to  formally  renounce  the  right  of  impress- 
ment of  sailors  on  American  ships.  Along  the  ocean  coast 
the  British  had  adopted  a  war  of  incursion,  plunder  and  the 
torch.  They  had  burned  several  towns  in  Connecticut  and 
elsewhere,  had  occupied  Washington,  driven  out  the  Govern- 
ment and  burned  the  capitol.  Everywhere  a  determined  front 
of  the  people  was  seen  except  in  the  East.  No  son  of  New 
England  can  remember  without  pain  and  shame  the  record 
of  that  section." 

With  how  much  more  pain  and  shame  ought  New  England 
to  remember  her  course  toward  the  South  in  the  years  of  the  6o's  ? 
The  South  only  acted  on  the  principles  of  secession  New  Eng- 
land had  openly  taught  from  the  hour  she  entered  the  Union,  yet, 
more  savage  than  any  enraged  tiger,  New  England  turned  on  the 
South,  shouting  rebel!  traitor!  traitor!  rebel!  and  when  Lincoln 
let  slip  the  dogs  of  war,  as  they  bounded  southward.  New  Eng- 
land sicked  them  on  to  greater  fury,  crying,  "On,  Lion  !  On,  Tiger! 
On,  Wolf !     Tear !  Rend !  Devour !" 

Unlike  New  England,  the  South  did  not  choose  a  time  to 
secede  when  it  could  hurt  the  Union.  New  England  deliberately 
and  of  set  purpose  deferred  secession  until  the  Union  was  in  the 
throes  of  war  with  a  powerful  enemy. 

It  was  stated  at  that  time  that — 


128  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     19 

"Two-thirds  of  the  army  in  Canada  are  at  this  moment 
eating  beef  provided  by  American  (New  England)  contract- 
ors. The  road  to  St.  Reges  is  covered  with  droves  of  cattle 
and  the  river  with  rafts,  destined  for  the  English.  'Were  it 
not  for  these  supplies,'  wrote  General  Isard  to  the  Secretary 
of  War,  'the  British  forces  would  soon  suffer  a  famine.'  In 
return  Old  England  exempted  Massachusetts,  Connecticut 
and  New  Hampshire  from  blockade." 

"The  Federalists  now  discussed  the  plan  of  withdrawing 
all  New  England  troops  to  their  own  soil.    Governor  Critten- 
den of  Vermont  issued  orders  to  Vermont  regiments  in  New 
York  to  return  home.    The  officers  read  the  proclamation  to 
the  troops ;  all  of  them  united  in  sending  back  word  to  Crit- 
tenden that  they  would  not  obey  him.      'We  are,'   said  they, 
'in  the  service  of  the  United  States,  and  your  power  over  us 
is  suspended  until  we  are  discharged.    We  regard  your  proc- 
lamations with  mingled  emotions  of  pity  and  contempt.'  " 
After  Lawrence's  splendid  sea  fight  the  whole  nation  held  a 
holiday,  but  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  passed  a  resolution 
that— 

"It  does  not  become  a  religious  people  to  express  any 
approbation  of  military  or  naval  exploits  not  immediately 
defensive." 

"This  was  twaddle,"  remarks  Powell.  It  was  worse 
than  twaddle.  It  was  an  effort  to  throw  a  religious  cloak 
over  a  mean,  contemptible  act, 

"The  proposition  was  discussed  of  forming  a  separate 
treaty  of  peace  with  Great  Britain." 

"The  Governor  of  Connecticut  in  August  withdrew  all 
the  State  militia  from  the  command  of  national  officers.  New 
England  was  practically  in  rebellion.  It  had  seceded  from 
united  national  action,  and  had  set  up  a  new  Confederacy. 
Governor  Strong  called  the  Legislature  and  said  to  them: 
'The  national  Government  has  failed  to  protect  Massachu- 
setts from  invasion  or  attack ;  we  must  henceforth  look  to 
God  and  ourselves.'  He  more  than  hinted  that  the  time  had 
come  for  separate  New  England  alliances." 

"The  Boston  Centinel  declared  tl.c  Union  was  as  good 
as  dissolved." 

"The  very  day  that  dispatches  from  Ghent  announced  the 
peace  proposals  of  England,  the  Massachusetts  Legislature 
issued  a  call  for  a  conference  of  New  Er^^land  States  to  be 
held  at  Hartford.    Connecticut   and  Rhode  Island  promptly 


Chap.   19  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  129 

responded.  The  Boston  Centinel  spoke  of  Massachusetts, 
Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island  as  the  first  three  pillars  in  a 
new  Federal  edifice.  It  was  proposed  to  make  a  special  and 
separate  treaty  of  peace  with  England.  In  the  conference  at 
Hartford  there  were  thirty-six  delegates,  representing  not 
only  the  three  States  named,  but  parts  of  Vermont  and  New 
Hampshire.     Governor  Morris  wrote: 

"If  not  too  tame  and  timid,  you  will  be  hailed  hereafter 
as  the  patriots  and  sages  of  your  generation." 

"It  was  proposed  in  the  Hartford  convention  that  New 
England  should  create  State  armies  for  self-defense." 

"The  Massachusetts  Legislature,  in  session  at  Boston, 
passed  a  resolution  to  send  a  delegation  to  demand  the  taxes, 
as  proposed  by  the  Hartford  convention.  Governor  Strong 
undertook  at  once  to  raise  a  State  army  and  in  every  way 
to  create  an  independent  commonwealth.  It  was  proposed  to 
seize  the  national  taxes.  At  the  same  time  Massachusetts 
refused  to  co-operate  with  the  Union  Government  in  driving 
the  British  from  Maine." 

"Jack.son  reached  New  Orleans  in  time.  He  swept 
hindrances  out  of  the  way  with  a  high  hand,  and  then  nearly 
annihilated  the  British.  The  victory  was  complete.  Mean- 
while at  Ghent  had  been  signed  the  most  extraordinar- 
treaty  England  ever  executed.  Beginning  with  high  and 
lofty  demands,  her  commissioners  had  been  crowded  by  the 
Americans  to  yield  at  one  point  and  another  until  we  had 
won  a  triumph  of  diplomacy  greater  than  our  triumphs  at 
arms. 

"The  points  first  demanded  by  England  were  that  Amer- 
ica must  yield  all  the  Northwest,  including  >Tichigan,  Wis- 
consin, Illinois,  a  larsre  part  of  Indiana,  and  one-third  of 
Ohio,  as  a  perpetual  Indian  Territory,  a  barrier  between  Can- 
ada and  the  United  States ;  that  we  must  renounce  our  right 
to  keep  armed  vessels  on  the  lakes  or  military  posts  on  the 
shores,  and  thirdly,  we  must  relinquish  a  considerable  portion 
of  Maine  to  be  British  property.  These  terms  the  members 
of  the  Hartford  convention  and  the  foremost  men  of  New 
England  declared  were  just  and  liberal.  The  rest  of  the 
States  indignantly  spurned  the  proposals.  Adams  wrote  to 
Madison  to  continue  the  war  forever  rather  than  yield  one 
acre  of  territory  or  the  fisheries  or  impressments. 

"New  England,  by  election,  resolutions  and  conventions, 


130  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     19 

had  declared  all  the  British  demands  were  just,  and  to  grant 
thern  would  be  political  wisdom. 

"Peace  was  declared,  but  not  one  single  British  demand 
had  been  yielded.  The  war  had  been  fought  under  terrible 
disadvantages  (fought  by  Democrats  drawn  from  the  South 
and  West),  but  it  had  accomplished  more  permanent  ad- 
vantages to  civilization  than  any  other  two  years'  war  in 
history.  It  made  the  oceans  a  vast  republic.  It  established 
the  freedom  of  the  seas.  It  established  the  great  doctrine  of 
individual  rights." — Powell's  Nulhfication  and  Secession. 

Of  Massachusetts'  treacherous  course  Jefferson  wrote  to 
General  Dearborn:  "Oh  Massachusetts!  how  have  I  lament- 
ed the  degradation  of  your  apostacy — Massachusetts,  with 
whom  I  worked  with  pride  in  1776!  If  her  humiliation  can 
just  give  her  modesty  enough  to  suppose  that  her  Southern 
brethren  are  somewhat  on  a  par  with  her  in  wisdom,  in  infor- 
mation, in  patriotism,  in  bravery,  even  in  honesty,  she  will 
more  justly  estimate  her  relative  momentum  in  the  Union." 

For  Massachusetts,  modesty  was  not  possible.  Too  long  she 
had  been  teaching  herself  that  she  was  the  most  virtuous  and 
intellectual  State  in  the  Union,  if  not  in  the  world.  Even  in  her 
youth  she  had  conceitedly  drawn  close  about  her  a  robe  of  self- 
righteousness  and  said  to  the  South  and  West,  "Stand  back !  I 
am  holier  than  thou." 

New  England  had  so  long  calumniated  Southern  people, 
calumniation  had  become  a  sort  of  craze  with  her.  It  is  quite 
possible  that  she  had  come  to  believe  her  own  falsehoods.  While 
using  slavery  as  a  weapon  to  beat  down  the  Union,  the  people  of 
the  South,  the  Democratic  party  she  hated,  now  and  then  she 
managed  to  get  possession  of  some  negro,  who  may  or  may  not 
have  been  cruelly  abused  by  his  master,  and  she  made  use  of  that 
negro  to  charge  every  man  and  woman  in  the  South  with  cruelty. 

It  never  occurred  to  her  to  remember  that  as  good  a  charge 
of  cruelty  could  be  brought  against  every  husband  in  America 
because  now  and  then  some  husband  cruelly  abused  his  wife,  beat 
or  choked  her  to  death.  Even  in  1796,  while  still  engaged  in  the 
slave  traffic,  while  still  bringing  cargoes  of  negroes  from  Africa 
and  sending  them  South  to  be  sold  to  rice  and  cotton  planters, 
this  self-righteous  New  England  had  the  gall  to  proclaim  the  ly- 
ing charge  that  the  people  of  the  South  were  barbarians,  were  a 


Chap.  20  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  131 

"race  of  demons,"  and  would  "enjoy  killing  and  eating  negroes 
if  they  liked  the  taste  of  black  flesh" — eating  negroes  they,  the 
pious  Puritans  of  New  England,  had  stolen  from  Africa  and 
brought  to  this  Western  continent! 


CHAPTER  XX. 

New  England's  Three  Hates  Still  Active.  The  Republican  Party 
is  Organised,  1854.  Republican  Historians  not  Trustworthy. 
Ambassador  Choate  bears  False  Witness.  Senator  Sumner's 
Curious  Lapse.  A  Few  Facts  Uncovered. 

Notwithstanding  all  the  evidence  we  have  given,  and  as  much 
more  staring  the  seeker  of  historic  truth  in  the  face,  it  now  suits 
Republican  writers  to  assert  that  the  people  of  the  Northern 
States  always  had  held  that  secession  is  a  political  crime,  always 
had  abhorred  disunion,  always  had  felt  that  a  higher  allegiance 
was  due  to  the  Union  Government  than  to  that  of  their  own  States. 
Republicans  persist  in  the  assertion  that  South  Carolina  was 
"the  breeding  place  of  secession  and  that  secession  was  and  is 
a  leprosy  of  the  mind  more  loathsome  than  leprosy  of  the  body." 
In  "Nullification  and  Secession"  the  author  makes  the  statement 
that— 

"From  the  day  of  our  great  victory  over  Great  Britian, 
in  181 5,  New  England  became  among  the  faithful  most  faith- 
ful to  the  Union." 

On  what  evidence  Mr.  Powell  based  this  statement  does  not 
appear ;  it  certainly  is  far  from  fact.  New  England  continued  to 
*hold  her  three  hates,  each  one  as  strong,  black  and  bitter,  as  be- 
fore the  war  of  1812.  Her  hate  of  the  Union  had  not  for  a 
moment  ceased  or  softened ;  her  hate  of  Democracy  and  of  the 
people  of  the  South  because  they  were  Democrats  was  as  unre- 
lenting as  ever ;  her  desire  to  sever  the  Union  was  as  strong  as 
ever.  New  England  experienced  no  change  of  heart,  as  will  be 
seen  from  the  extracts  I  shall  now  lay  before  the  reader.  Ample 
proof  exists  that  New  England  was  as  eager  as  ever  for  disunion. 
On  the  24th  of  February,  1842,  John  Quincy  Adams  presented 
A  petition  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  signed  by  a  largt 
number  of  citizens  of  Haverhill,  Mass.,  for  a  peaceable  dissolution 
of  the  Union,  assigning  as  one  of  the  reasons  the  inequality  of 
benefits  conferred  upon  the  different  sections. 

See  Blake's  History  of  Slavery,  page  524. 

And  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History,  page  26. 


132  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     20 

"On  the  28th  of  February,  1842,  Mr.  Joshua  R.  Gid- 
dings,  member  of  Congress  from  Ohio,  presented  a  petition 
from  a  large  number  of  citizens  of  Austinburg  in  his  district, 
praying  for  a  dissokition  of  the  Union.  Mr.  Triplett  of  Ken- 
tucky, who  considered  the  petition  disrespectful  to  both 
Houses,  moved  that  it  be  not  received.  Ayes  24  for  reception. 
Noes  116."    (See  Blake's  History  of  Slavery,  page  529.) 

The  following  extract,  page  145,  from  one  of  a  series  of 
pamphlets  issued  for  circulation  in  Massachusetts  in  1852,  shows 
New  England's  unabated  animosity  to  the  Union : 

"Fidelity  to  the  cause  of  human  freedom  and  allegiance 
to  God  require  that  the  existing  national  compact  should  be 
instantly  dissolved  ;  that  secession  from  the  Government  is  a 
religious  and  a  political  duty." 

In  another  paragraph  of  this  same  paper  is  the  following  em- 
phatic declaration:  "To  continue  this  disastrous  alliance  longer  is 
madness."  In  1854  the  dismembered  Federals  of  New  England  and 
the  disorganized  Whigs  united  and  lormed  the  Republican  party. 
These  old  disunionists  rmder  their  new  name  took  up  the  fight 
on  the  three  objects  of  New  England's  hate — Democracy,  the 
Union  and  the  South — exactly  where  the  Federals  had  ceased  their 
open  fight  in  181 5.  So  far  from  New  England's  sentiments 
having  softened  since  that  time,  her  three  hates,  under  the  lead  of 
Republicans,  assumed  the  force  and  fury  of  insanity,  as  may  be 
seen  in  reports  of  speeches,  sermons  and  lectures.  Men  of  New 
England  who  emigrated  West  carried  with  them  all  three  hates, 
and  when  the  Republican  party  was  organized  they  made  haste  to 
enter  its  ranks  and  take  up  the  work  of  disunion  and  secession. 
These  men  of  the  new  party  possessed  more  zeal,  more  audacity, 
more  duplicity  and  less  candor  than  their  progenitors,  the  Fed- 
erals. These  latter  had  always  fought  Democracy  in  the  open ; 
the  more  astute  Republicans  saw  that  they  could  never  win  the 
suffrages  of  the  common  people  if  they  exposed  their  imperialistic 
features,  therefore  from  the  day  of  their  organization  they  fought 
behind  a  mask.  The  Republican  party  never  at  any  period  took 
the  people  into  their  confidence.  But  they  affected  high  moral 
ideas  and  benevolent  principles,  which  won  many  to  their  ranks. 
The  old  Federals  had  always  spoken  of  negroes  in  contemptuous 
terms.  Republicans  saw  what  an  engine  of  power  they  could 
make  of  slavery  to  batter,  beat  down  and  cover  with  false  charges 
and  malignant  calumnies  the  three  objects  of  their  hatred,  and 


Chap.  20  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


133 


most  effective  use  they  made  of  that  engine.  They  either  forgot  or 
ignored  the  fact  that  their  own  New  England  States  were  chiefly 
responsible  for  the  existence  of  that  black  curse  on  this  Western 
continent.  Men  of  Massachusetts  scrupled  at  no  subterfuge,  no 
deception,  no  falsehood,  in  efforts  to  make  the  world  believe  their 
own  States  were  and  ever  had  been  free  from  the  sin  of  slavery. 
They  pushed  back  out  of  sight  the  hideous  fact  that  Massachu- 
setts men  had  built  ships  and  sent  them  to  Africa  to  bring  back 
cargoes  of  negroes,  which  they  sold  either  in  the  West  Indies,  the 
Bermudas  or  to  Southern  planters.  The  dreadful  word,  "Middle 
Passage,"  with  all  its  horrors,  was  seldom  or  never  uttered  or 
written  by  a  Massachusetts  man.  Men  of  New  England  affected 
to  believe  only  the  Southern  States  were  guilty  of  the  sin  of 
slavery.  Lecturers,  historians  and  senators  joined  in  this  decep- 
tive work,  and  to  this  day  falsehoods  are  told  on  this  subject.  In- 
stance the  address  delivered  by  Ambassador  to  England  Choate 
a  few  months  ago  to  the  Philosophic  Society  of  Edinburg,  Scot- 
land. Branching  off  from  the  main  line  of  his  address.  Ambassa- 
dor Choate  seized  the  occasion  to  enlighten  the  members  of  that 
philosophical  society  on  the  subject  of  slavery  in  America. 

''Negro  slavery,"  said  the  Ambassador,  "was  firmly  estab- 
lished in  the  Southern  States  at  an  early  period  of  their  his- 
tory. In  1619  a  Dutch  ship  discharged  a  cargo  of  African 
slaves  at  Jamestown,  Virginia.  All  through  the  colonial 
period  their  importation  continued.  A  few  negroes  found 
their  way  up  into  the  Northern  States." 

This  is  the  way  New  England  men  "make  and  take  their 
history."  "A  few  negroes  found  their  zvay  up  into  the  Northern 
States,"  and  this  from  a  descendant  of  Puritans  who  carried  on 
the  slave  traffic,  importing  negroes  from  Africa  for  over  a  hun- 
dred years.  The  careful  way  Ambassador  Choate  phrases  his 
sentences  to  make  them  bear  false  witness  is  something  to  wonder 
at,  and  the  dishonesty  involved  is  something  to  blush  for.  What 
are  the  plain  facts  of  history? 

A  Dutch  ship  did  stop  at  Jamestown  in  161 9  and  leave,  not 
a  cargo,  but  eleven  slaves,  not  one  of  which  remained  on  Virginia 
soil.  Those  eleven  negro  slaves  had  been  brought  from  the  Earl 
of  Warwick's  plantation,  on  the  Isle  of  Summers,  one  of  the  Ber- 
mudas. Their  owner,  the  Earl  of  Warwick,  had  them  carried 
back  as  soon  as  possible  to  his  plantation  on  the  Isle  of  Summers. 

If  the  importation  of  negroes  continued  all  during  the  colo- 
nial period.  New  England  ships  carried  on  that  importation,  and 


134  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     20 

New  England  State  kept  up  that  importation  until  the  year  1808. 
Massachusetts  went  into  the  slave  traffic  as  early  as  1637.  Chief 
Justice  Parsons  declared  from  the  bench  that — 

"Slavery  was  introduced  into  Massachusetts  soon  after 
its  first  settlement." 

Is  it  possible  that  Ambassador  Choate  is  ignorant  of  these 
facts  ? 

George  H.  Moore,  L.  L.  D.,  librarian  of  the  New  York  His- 
torical Society,  afterwards  superintendent  of  the  Lenox  Library, 
in  "Notes  on  History  of  Slavery  in  Massachusetts,"  says : 

"I  charge  nearly  all  the  orators,  historians,  lawyers, 
clergymen  and  statesmen  of  Massachusetts  with  either  igno- 
rance of  the  facts  of  history  or  evading  and  falsifying  them." 

Mr.  George  W.  Williams,  Judge  Advocate  of  the  Grand 
Army  of  the  Republic  of  Ohio,  in  his  "History  of  the  Negro  Race 
in  America,"  calls  attention  to  the  above  charges  of  Mr.  Moore 
and  comments  thus : 

"Despite  the  indisputable  evidence  of  the  legalized  exist- 
ence of  slavery  in  Massachusetts,  the  historians,  lawyers, 
clergymen,  orators  and  statesmen  of  New  England  continue 
to  assert  that  slavery,  though  it  did  creep  into  the  colony  of 
Massachusetts  and  did  exist,  it  was  not  by  force  of  any  law, 
as  none  such  is  known  to  have  existed." 

Moore  says :  "Massachusetts'  first  code  of  laws  established 
slavery  in  that  colony,  and,  at  the  very  birth  of  the  foreign 
commerce  of  New  England,  the  African  slave  trade  became  a 
regular  business." 

Yet  in  spite  of  indisputable  evidence,  showing  that  New 
England  from  1637  to  1808  was  actively  engaged  in  the  slave 
traffic,  and  that  New  England  ships  brought  over  cargoes  of  ne- 
groes from  Africa,  discharged  those  left  alive  from  the  horrors 
of  the  "Middle  Passage"  at  New  England  ports,  there  to  recuper- 
ate before  sending  them  South  to  be  sold  to  the  cotton  and  rice 
planters,  in  spite  of  all  this  evidence.  Ambassador  Choate  had  the 
hardihood  to  represent  to  his  Scotch  audience  that  the  Northern 
States  were  guiltless  of  the  sin  of  slavery,  and  only  a  "fetv  negroes 
found  their  zvay  up  to  Northern  States."  On  June  28,  1854, 
Charles  Sumner,  a  son  of  Massachusetts,  from  the  Senate  floor, 
made  the  false  assertion  that — 

"In  all  her  annals  no  person  was  ever  born  a  slave  on 
the  soil  of  Massachusetts." 

I  charge  that  men  making  such  assertions   were  and  are 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  135 

either  disgracefully  ignorant  of  the  facts  of  history   or  disgrace- 
fully dishonest. 

In  Elliott's  "Debates  in  the  Convention  of  1787,"  \^ol.  I,  pages 
264-5,  ^^y  ^^  found  the  following  story  illustrative  of  Massachu- 
setts character: 

"The  original  committee  of  thirteen  in  1787  recommend- 
ed that  the  constitutional  license  to  the  slave  traffic  should 
cease  at  the  period  of  1800." 

This  not  suiting  some  of  New  England's  States  at  that  time 
engaged  in  the  slave  traffic,  it  was  moved  and  seconded  to  amend 
the  report  of  the  committee  of  eleven,  entered  on  the  journal  of 
August  21,  1787,  as  follows: 

"To  strike  out  the  words  eighteen  hundred  and  insert 
the  words  eighteen  hundred  and  eight." 

•  "This  motion  was  seconded ;  the  vote  stood  as  follows : 
"Yeas — New  Hampshire,    Connecticut,    Massachusetts, 
Maryland,  North  and  South  Carolina,  Georgia." 

"Nays — New  Jersey,  Delaware,  Pennsylvania  and  Vir- 
ginia."    (See  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History.) 

By  this  it  is  seen  that  Massachusetts  and  two  other  New  Eng- 
land States,  by  their  votes,  procured  the  continuance  of  the  dam- 
nable slave  traffic  eight  years  longer  than  Virginia  wanted  it  to 
continue. 

Dr.  Dabney  of  Virginia  states  that  it  is  estimated  that  in  the 
years  from  1787  to  1808  new  England's  slave  ships  brought  from 
Africa  and  sold  either  to  the  South's  planters  or  in  the  West 
Indies  one  million  slaves.  Yet  from  that  year,  1787,  from  the 
very  hour  New  England's  three  States  voted  to  continue  the  slave 
traffic,  Massachusetts  has  held  close  about  her  her  robe  of  self- 
righteousness,  scornfully  saying  to  Virginia,  "Stand  back!  I  am 
holier  than  thou!" 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

Save  the  Union,  Free  Slaves  the  Pretext,  Not  the  Purpose,  of 
the  War  on  the  South.  Real  Cause,  Hatred  of  Democracy. 
Mr.  A.  K.  Fisk,  a  distinguished  Republican,  throws  some 
light  on  the  relationship  of  the  two  parties,  Hamilton's  and 
Jefferson's ;  in  other  words,  the  party  favoring  Monarchy  and  the 
party  favoring  Democracy,  the  rule  of  the  people. 


136  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 

"Hamilton  and  Jefferson,"  says  Fisk  in  the  North  Amer- 
ican Reviezv  of  April,  1879,  page  410,  "represent  the  two 
opposing  ideas  which  prevailed  at  the  time  our  Government 
was  formed,  and  which,  with  some  variations,  have  been  the 
basis  of  our  political  divisions  into  parties  ever  since,  and 
have  been  involved  in  all  the  contests  and  controversies  in 
our  constitutional  career.  Hamilton  embodied  the  tendency 
to  a  centralization  of  power  in  the  national  Government. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  he  would  have  preferred  a  monarchy. 
Jefferson,  on  the  other  hand,  represented  the  demand  for  a 
complete  diffusion  of  sovereignty  among  the  people,  and  its 
exercise  locally  and  in  the  States,  and  the  confining  of  nation- 
al functions  as  closely  as  possible  under  the  most'  restrictive 
interpretation  of  the  Constitution." 

Mr.  Fisk  admits  that  Hamilton,  the  monarchist,  represented 
the  party  which  opposed  the  sovereignty  of  the  people.  A  writer 
in  the  St.  Louis  Globe-Democrat,  a  staunch  advocate  of  Hamil  • 
ton's  strong  government  doctrines,  in  that  paper,  March  6,  1898, 
made  this  significant  comment : 

"The  resemblance  between  Hamilton  and  Lincoln  is  so 
close  no  one  can  resist  it.  Hamilton  is  dwarfed  by  no  man. 
A  just  parallel  of  Hamilton  and  Lincoln  will  show  them 
alike  in  many  ways.  They  were  alike  almost  to  the  point  of 
identity.    Hamilton's  work  made  Lincoln's  possible." 

Hamilton's  monarchic  principles  certainly  made  Lincoln's 
work  possible.  Lincoln  put  in  practice  what  Hamilton  had  ad- 
vocated. Hamilton  made  no  concealment  of  his  monarchic  prin- 
ciples ;  he  preferred  a  monarchy  such  as  England  has,  but  failing 
that  he  wanted  a  President  for  life  and  the  Governors  of  States 
appointed  by  the  President.  Until  seated  in  the  White  House, 
Lincoln  talked  Democracy  and  affected  great  esteem  for  Jeffer- 
son's Democratic  principles. 

As  soon  as  he  held  in  his  grip  the  machinery  of  government, 
he  schemed  for  absolute  power,  and  as  soon  as  he  was  command- 
er in  chief  of  nearly  3,000,000  armed  men,  no  imperial  despot  in 
pagan  time  ever  wielded  more  autocratic  power  than  did  Abraham 
Lincoln,  and  Republican  writers  of  today  are  so  imbued  with 
imperialism  they  laud  and  glorify  Lincoln  for  his  usurpation  of 
power. 

Although  well  informed  Republicans  know  that  the  war  on 
the  South  was  waged  neither  to  save  the  Union  nor  to  free 
slaves,  it  does  not  suit  that  party  to  be  candid  on  this  subject. 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  137 

Now  and  then,  however,  some  Republican  forgets  the  party's 
policy  of  secrecy  and  tells  the  truth.  That  boldly  imperialistic 
Republican  journal,  the  Globe-Democrat,  of  St.  Louis,  in  its  issue 
of  April  9,  1900,  had  an  article  which  uncovers  facts,  even  to  the 
foundation  stones,  on  which  rested  the  war  of  the  6o's.  Consider 
the  following: 

"Lincoln,  Grant  and  the  Union  armies  gave  a  victory 
to  Hamiltonism  (Monarchy)  when  it  subjugated  the  Confed- 
erates (Democrats)  in  the  South.  (This  is  strictly  true;  it 
was  a  victory  over  Democracy  by  Monarchy.)  The  cardi- 
nal doctrines  of  Democracy  are  the  enlargement  of  the  power 
of  the  States.  All  the  pridigious  energies  of  the  war  could 
not  extinguish  these.  The  lesson  of  the  war  was  extreme 
and  extraordinary,  and  yet  in  a  sense  ineffective." 

Ineffective,  because  it  did  not  crush  out  the  very  Hfe  of 
Democracy.  Monarchists  always  appear  to  be  ignorant  of  the 
fact  that  there  is  a  streak  of  divinity  in  Democracy  which  can  not 
be  killed.  Monarchy  a  thousand  and  ten  thousand  times  has 
fancied  it  has  forever  put  an  end  to  Democracy,  but  sooner  or 
later  it  rises  up,  fronts  and  fights  for  the  rights  of  humanity  with 
all  its  power. 

"The  Democrats,"  continues  theGlobe-Democrat,  "have 
been  since  the  war  more  strenuous  than  before  in  insisting 
on  the  preservation  of  the  power  of  the  States." 

The  cardinal  doctrine  of  the  Democratic  party  has  not  been, 
since  the  formation  of  the  Union,  the  enlargement  of  State  power, 
but  has  been  the  preservation  of  the  power  reserved  to  the 
States  by  the  Constitution.  The  cardinal  power  of  the  Repub- 
lican party,  since  the  day  Mr.  Lincoln  assumed  the  Presidency,  has 
been  the  enlargement  of  executive  power.  No  well-informed 
man  can  deny  this. 

"If  there  was  no  absurd  sentiment,"  says  the  Globe-Dem- 
ocrat, "about  the  privileges  of  the  States  there  would  be  no 
campaign  on  imperialism." 

Had  there  been  no  absurd  "sentiment"  about  human  freedom 
in  1776  there  would  have  been  no  campaign  against  the  English 
King. 

"Back  of  all  opposition,"  continues  the  Globe-Democrat, 
"to  imperialism,  whatever  form  it  takes,  is  the  old  doctrine 


138  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 

that  the  rights  reserved  by  the  Constitution  to  the  States  are 
heing  invaded." 

This  is  strctly  true.  What  shadow  of  right  had  or  has  im- 
periaHsts  to  encroach  on  the  rights  reserved  by  the  Constitution 
to  the  States?  Such  encroachment  is  an  audacious  usurpation  of 
power  and  a  dishonest  violation  of  the  original  contract  between 
the  States  and  the  Federal  Union. 

"The  old  Federals,"  says  the  Globe-Democrat,  "fought 
it  (Democracy)  valiantly,  but  it  was  reserved  for  the  Repub- 
lican party  to  conquer  it." 

Had  the  Republican  party  fought  in  the  open,  as  did  the 
old  Federals,  it  never  would  have  defeated  Democracy.  Had  it 
fought  in  the  open,  exposing  its  monarchic  principles,  the  people 
of  the  Northern  States  never  would  have  aided  it  to  crush  and 
conquer  Democracy.  From  its  birth  in  1854,  the  Republican  party 
has  fought  behind  a  mask.  Its  imperial  features  have  never  been 
uncovered  and  exposed  to  the  people's  gaze.  It  has  ever  posed 
before  the  people  as  the  champion  of  the  people's  rights. 

The  following  extracts,  mostly  taken  from  S.  D.  Carpenter's 
Logic  of  History,  show  New  England's  continued  hate  of  the 
Union.     In  Massachusetts'  State  convention,  1851,  it  was — 

"Resolved,  That  the  one  issue  before  the  country  is  dis- 
solution of  the  Union,  in  comparison  with  which  all  other 
issues  are  as  dust  in  the  balance ;  therefore,  we  have  given 
ourselves  to  the  work  of  annulling  this  covenant  with  death." 
In  1856  Lloyd  Garrison  in  a  speech  loudly  declared: 

"I  have  said,  and  I  say  again,  that  in  proportion  to  the 
growth  of  disunion  will  be  the  growth  of  the  Republican 
cause.    This  Union  is  a  lie!" 

James  S.  Pike,  appointed  Minister  to  the  Netherlands,  said : 

"This  Union  is  not  worth  supporting  in  connection  with 
the  South." 

Frederick  Douglas,  half  negro,  half  white,  a  great  man  in 
the  Republican  party,  in  a  speech  said : 

"From  this  time  forth  I  consecrate  the  labor  of  my  life 
to  the  dissolution  of  the  Union,  and  I  care  not  whether  the 
bolt  that  rends  it  shall  come  from  heaven  or  from  hell!" 

Loud  and  long  applause. 

These  were  the  sentiments,  so  far  as  I  can  learn,  of  every 
man  in  the  Republican  party. 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


139 


The  Rev.  Andrew  T.  Foss,  at  a  meeting  in  New  York,  May 
15th,  1857,  said: 

"There  never  has  been  an  hour  when  this  infamous  Union 
should  have  been  made,  and  now  the  hour  has  to  be  prayed 
for  when  it  shall  be  dashed  to  pieces  forever!  I  hate  the 
Union !" 

In  1850  Wm.  Lloyd  Garrison,  in  a  speech,  shouted  out  with 
p^reat  vehemence : 

"A  thousand  times  accursed  be  this  Union !" 
Eli  Thayer,  in  "Kansas  Crusade,"  says : 

"These  men  of  New  England  were  the  original  seces- 
sionists. They  had  advocated  secession  and  dissolution  of 
the  Union  for  twenty  years  before  Jefferson  Davis  put  those 
doctrines  in  practice." 

Mr.  Thayer  makes  a  mistake  by  fully  forty  years.  The  men 
of  New  England  first,  as  Federalists,  had  preached  disunion  and 
secession  from  1796  up  to  the  very  hour  the  Republican  party 
took  up  the  work  in  1854.  The  reader  must  not  lose  sight  of  the 
fact  that  th^  Republican  party  is  the  legitimate  offspring  of  the 
Federals,  and  had  inherited  all  its  progenitor's  faiths,  ambitions 
and  hates. 

The  genesis  is  straight,  as  follows : 

Federals  in  1796 — 1804 — 1814. 

Federal-Republican  ip  1824. 

Republican  in  1854. 

Union-Republican  from  the  beginning  of  the  war  to  its 
close. 

In  1855  Senator  Wade  of  Ohio,  at  a  mass  meeting  in  Maine, 
in  a  grand  passion  of  scorn  and  hate  of  the  Union,  threw  his  arms 
out  wide  and  shouted: 

"Let  us  sweep  away  this  remnant  which  we  call  a 
Union." 

In  another  speech  Wade  cried  out : 

"After  all  this  talk  of  a  Union  you  have  no  Union  worthy 
the  name." 

After  the  first  State  had  seceded,  Wendell  Phillips  cired  out 
rapturously : 

'"Disunion  is  the  sweetest  music!  What  if  a  State  has  no 
right  to  secede ?  Of  what  consequence  is  that?  A  Union  is 
made  up  of  willing  States,  not  «f  conquerors  and  conquered. 
Confederacies    invariably   tend    to    dismemberment.       The 


140  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 

Union  was  a  wall  built  up  hastily;  its  cement  has  crumbled 
hastily.  Why  should  we  seek  to  stop  seceded  States  ?  Merely 
to  show  we  can?    Let  the  South  go  in  peace." 

Alas!  Alas!  This  just  spirit  did  not  remain  with  Phillips.  Did 
the  smell  of  blood  from  battlefields  gangrene  his  mind  and  heart  ? 
As  the  war  went  on  there  came  times  when  Mr.  Phillips'  hate  of 
the  South  seemed  to  hurt  him  so,  he  cried  out  in  spasms  of  pain, 
as  when  in  a  speech  in  Beecher's  church  his  hate  became  so  acute 
and  frenzied  he  demanded  the  exile  or  hanging  at  one  fell  swoop 
of  347,000  men  of  the  South.  Before  Phillips  became  poisoned  by 
the  smell  of  blood  he  had  boldly  declared  the  South's  right  to 
independence,  right  to  secede,  and  as  boldly  had  warned  President 
Lincoln  that  he  had  no  right  to  send  one  armed  man  on  the 
South. 

In  another  speech,  full  of  insane  hate  of  the  South,  Phillips 
said: 

"Washington  was  a  sinner!  It  becomes  an  American 
to  cover  his  face  when  he  places  Washington's  bust  among 
the  great  men  of  the  world." 

Redman,  a  friend  and  follower  of  Phillips,  had  &ie  hate  in- 
sanity as  badly  as  Phillips. 

"And  I,"  shouted  Redman,  "would  like  to  spit  on  that 
scoundrel,  Washington." 

It  is  quite  possible  that  both  these  men  had  come  to  belie-ve 
so  strongly  in  their  own  self-righteousness  as  to  think  they  hated 
Washington  because  he  had  been  a  slave-holder.  It  never  oc- 
curred to  them  to  remember  the  sins  of  their  own  Massachusetts 
ancestors,  their  long  continued  traffic  in  slaves. 

The  True  American,  a  Republican  paper  of  Erie,  Penn.,  said : 
"All  this  twaddle  about  preserving  the  Union  is  too  silly 
and  sickening  for  anything." 

August  23d,  1 85 1,  the  New  Hampton,  Massachusetts,  Ga- 
zette announced  that  a  petition  was  circulating  in  that  region  for 
the  dissolution  of  the  Unon,  and  that  more  than  one  hundred  and 
fifty  names  of  legal  voters  had  signed  it.  In  1854  New  England 
sent  to  Congress  a  petition,  numerously  signed,  praying  for  the 
dissolution  of  the  Union,  using  these  words : 

"We  earnestly  request  Congress  to  take  measures  for 
the  speedy,  peaceful  and  equitable  dissolution  of  the  Union." 

In  1854  John  P.  Hale,  Chase  and  Seward  voted  to  receive 
and  consider  a  petition  demanding  the  dissolution  of  the  Union. 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods.   .  141 

These  three  men  had  long  been  anxious  to  break  the  Union  to 
pieces. 

In  1848  Seward  voted  to  receive  a  petition  to  dissolve  the 
Union,  yet  Seward  was  the  man  who  urged  Lincoln  to  begin  war, 
on  the  pretext  of  saving  the  Union.  In  1857  a  meeting  was  held 
in  Massachusetts,  during  which  the  question  of  war  on  the  South 
was  discussed.  Gerritt  Smith,  an  ardent  disunion  Republican. 
said : 

"The  time  has  not  yet  come  to  use  physical  force  on  the 
South." 

Mr,  Langdon  of  Ohio  in  a  speech  said: 

"Why  preserve  the  Union?  It  is  not  worth  preserving. 
I  hate  the  Union  as  I  hate  hell!" 

Carpenter's  Logic  of  History  says  in  1852  a  series  of  pam- 
phlets were  issued  advocating  disunion,  from  which  is  taken  the 
following : 

"To  longer  continue  this  disastrous  alliance  (the  Union) 
is  madness.  Allegiance  to  God  and  fidelity  to  the  cause  of 
freedom  requires  that  the  national  compact  shall  be  in- 
stantly dissolved.  Secession  from  the  Government  is  a  relig- 
ious and  political  duty." 

Joshua  R.  Giddings,  one  of  the  Republican  great  men,  in  1848 
introduced  a  petition  for  the  dissolution  of  the  Union.  Mr.  Lin- 
coln appointed  INIr.  Giddings  Consul  to  the  Canadas. 

Anson  Burlingame  so  hated  the  Union  and  the  Constitution 
he  declared  publicly  that  "we  needed  disunion,  we  needed  a  new 
Constitution,  a  new  Bible,  and  a  new  God."  Mr.  Lincoln  was  so 
pleased  with  Mr.  Burlingame  he  sent  him  Minister  to  China,  at 
the  same  time  pretending  to  look  on  disunion  as  the  most  mon- 
strous crime  a  people  can  commit,  and  to  punish  which  he  was 
devastating  the  South  with  an  army  of  over  2,000,000  men. 

At  a  Republican  convention,  held  at  Monroe,  Green  county, 
Wisconsin,  in  1856,  the  following  resolution  was  passed: 

"Resolved,  That  it  is  the  duty  of  the  North,  in  case  we 
fail  in  electing  a  President  and  Congress  that  will  restore 
freedom  to  Kansas,  to  revolutionize  the  Government." 

The  Boston  Liberator  had  an  article  headed  in  large  type : 

"But  one  issue!  The  dissolution  of  the  Union,"  and 
urges  the  people  to  get  up  monster  petitions  to  Congress  for 
dissolution  of  the  Union."  (See  Carpenter's  Logic  of  His- 
tory.) 


'4>  Facts  and  Falskhoods.  Chap,     21 

III  his  liobato.  1S5S,  with  Parson  Pryiic.  l\irsoii  Hrownlow,  a 
red  hot  Republican,  said : 

"A  dissohitioti  of  the  I'liion  is  what  a  large  portion  of 
the  Republieans  are  driving-  at." 

In  1S55,  ^"^"ly  ^^"^^  ><-"'^'"  fitter  the  Republican  party  was  or- 
g-anized.  Senator  Wade,  of  Ohio,  in  a  speech  made  in' I'ortland. 
Maine,  said : 

"There  is  really  no  Union  now  between  the  North  and 
the  Sotith.  I  believe  no  two  nations  on  earth  entertain  feel- 
ings of  more  bitter  rancor  toward  each  other  than  these  two 
j)eoplcs." 

Wni.  Lloyd  Garrison  said: 

"The  Republican  party  is  moulding  public  sentiment  in 
the  right  direction  for  the  dissolution  of  the  Union." 

Charles  Sumner  was  heart  and  soul  a  disunionist.  In  1854, 
September  7th.  at  Worcester.  -Massachusetts,  in  a  speech  Sumner 
said : 

"The  whole  dogiua  of  passive  obedience  to  law  must  be 
rejected,  in  whatever  guise  it  may  assume  and  under  what- 
ever alias  it  may  skulk,  whether  in  the  tyranny  and  usurpation 
of  king,  parliament  or  judicial  tribunal." 

On  November  2d,  1S59,  in  a  speedi  made  in  Brooklyn,  Wen- 
dell Phillips  made  the  following  remarkable  assertion: 

"\irg-inia  is  not  a  State!  Mr.  Wise  is  not  a  Governor! 
The  Union  is  not  a  nation !  All  these  so-called  Governments 
are  organized  piracies."     (, Logic  of  History,  page  68.) 

The  New  York  HcraUi  of  December,  1859.  gives  an  account 
of  a  Republican  meeting  in  Tremont  Temple.  Boston.  The  Hon. 
John  Andrews,  afterwards  Governor  of  Massachusetts,  said: 

"The  logic  of  bayonets  and  rifles  and  pikes  will  be  hence- 
forth used  against  the  South." 

Emerson,  the  so-called  New  England  philosopher,  was  at 
tliat  meeting  and  said : 

"We  must  go  back  to  the  original  form ;  in  other  words, 
go  back  to  the  original  right  of  resistance  and  revolution, 
and  nullify  the  Constitution  and  the  laws." 

General  Jamison,  on  January  22,  1S62,  made  a  speech  to  his 
soldiers,  which  was  published  in  the  Leavenworth  Constrzatne, 
in  which  he  said : 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehckjds. 


M3 


"This  is  a  war  which  dates  way  back  of  Fort  Sumt'^r ; 
ever  since  1854  we  have  been  making'  the  lonj^  campaign." 
The  Repubhcan  party  was  or^^anized  in  1854.  General  Jam- 
ison's knowledge  of  New  England's  history  did  not  go  back  of 
that  tlate ;  he  knew,  as  Wendell  Phillips  had  proclaimed,  that  the 
Republican  party  was  org^anized  to  work  against  the  South,  but 
apparently  did  not  know  that  party  merely  took  up  the  warfare 
its  progenitors,  the  Federals,  had  been  waging  against  the  South 
since  the  year  1796. 

On  December  25,  i860,  in  the  United  States  Senate,  Stephtm 

Douglas  said : 

"The  fact  can  no  longer  be  disguised  that  many 
Republican  Senators  desire  war  and  disunion  under  pretense 
of  saving  the  Union.  For  partisan  reasons  they  are  anxious 
to  destroy  the  Union.  They  want  this  done  without  holding 
them  responsible  before  the  people." 

The  Boston  CommonzL-ealth,  Senator  Sumner's  organ,  said : 

"How  dare  any  one  pray  for  the  preservation  of  that  sin 

and  shame,  the  Union?" 

In  another  issue  that  organ  said : 

"Unity  of  the  States  is  a  crime !  May  the  tongue  wither 
that  prays  for  the  preservation  of  that  festering  shame, 
the  Union." 

In  a  convention  held  in  Massachusetts  in  1856,  a  series  of  re>- 
olutions  were  passed,  of  which  the  following  are  samples : 

"Resolved,  ist.  That  the  necessit^"^  of  disunion  is  writ- 
ten in  the  whole  existing  character  and  condition  of  the  two 
sections  of  the  countrj'.  No  government  on  earth  is  strong 
enough  to  hold  together  such  opposing  forces." 

The  Roman  Empire's  government  was  strong  enough  to  hold 
together  for  years,  yet  in  time  it  broke  to  pieces.  This  imperial 
republican  government  sooner  or  later  will  do  the  same.  The 
second  resolution  of  that  convention  is  as  follows : 

"Resolved,  2d,  That  this  movement  does  not  merely  seek 
disunion,  but  the  expulsion  by  the  Northern  States  from  the 
Union  of  the  Southern  States.  The  one  great  issue  before  the 
country  is  the  dissolution  of  the  Union,  in  comparison  with 
which  all  other  issues  are  as  dust  in  the  balance;  therefore 
we  devote  ourselves  to  the  work  of  annulling  this  covenant 
with  death." 


144  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.    21 

So  long  had  the  gospel  of  hate  been  preached,  those  New 
Englanders  had  come  to  hate  the  South  so  venomously  they 
wanted  to  force  her  out  of  the  Union  she  loved.  Yet,  when  a 
few  years  later  the  Southern  people  left  the  Union,  driven  to 
secede  by  the  unrelenting  persecution  of  New  England,  these  very 
people  of  New  England  called  her  secession  a  crime  and  waged 
upon  her  bloody  war  for  doing  what  they  had  invited  her  to  do, 
as  will  be  seen  from  this  item. 

In  1859,  at  a  Republican  convention  in  New  York,  the  follow- 
ing resolution  was  unanimously  passed: 

"Resolved,  That  we  invite  a  free  correspondence  with  the 
disunionists  of  the  South,  in  order  that  we  may  decide  upon 
the  most  suitable  measures  to  bring  about  so  desirable  a  re- 
sult." 

The  New  York  Tribune,  a  Republican  paper,  edited  by  Hor- 
ace Greeley,  native  of  New  England,  said : 

"Who  wants  a  Union  which  is  nothing  but  a  sentiment  to 
lacquer  Fourth  of  July  orations  withal?  We  have  no  wish 
for  its  preservation." 

At  a  meeting  in  Faneuil  Hall,  Boston,  January  2,  3,  4,  1854, 

it  was — 

"Resolved,  That  we  seek  the  dissolution  of  this  Union, 
and  that  we  hereby  declare  ourselves  the  friends  of  a  new 
Confederacy  of  States,  and  for  a  dissolution  of  the  Union." 

Wm.  Lloyd  Garrison,  a  son  of  New  England,  a  great  man 
in  the  Republican  party,  in  a  speech  to  a  large  audience  cried 
aloud : 

"If  the  church  is  against  disunion,  I  pronounce  the 
church  of  the  devil !    Up  with  the  flag  of  disunion !" 

In  a  speech  made  May,  1858,  in  New  York  city,  Wendell 
Phillips  declared  that  for  the  last  nineteen  years  he  had  labored  to 
get  sixteen  States  out  of  the  Union.  When  in  1856,  February  25th, 
a  friend  said  to  Senator  Hale,  he  was  certain  there  would  ere  long 
be  war  with  the  South,  Hale,  eager  for  war,  rubbed  his  hands  and 
gleefully  said: 

"Good !  Good !    War  can't  come  to  soon." 

The  reader  will  observe  that  these  Republicans  were  as  anx- 
ious for  a  war  on  the  South  as  their  progenitors,  the  Federals, 
had  been.  In  1856,  Banks  of  Massachusetts,  in  a  speech  at  Port- 
land, Maine,  said : 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


145 


"I  am  not  one  who  cries  for  the  perpetuation  of  the 
Union,  I  am  wilHng  to  let  it  slide." 

Yet  while  Banks'  party  was  drenching  the  Southland  with 
blood  and  filling-  all  the  country,  North  and  South,  with  mourning, 
under  pretense  of  saving  a  Union  it  long  had  despised,  this  same 
Banks,  with  a  general's  epaulets  on  his  shoulders,  marched  at  the 
head  of  armed  legions  on  the  South  to  assist  in  the  murderous 
work.  In  1857,  in  the  fair  month  of  May,  the  Rev.  Andrew 
Forbes  shouted  out: 

"There  never  was  an  hour  when  this  blasphemous  and 

infamous  Union  should  have  been  made ;  now  the  hour  must 
be  prayed  for  when  it  will  be  dashed  to  pieces." 

Does  this  evidence  manifest  any  change  of  heart  in  New 
England  ?  Had  she  come  to  hate  Democracy  less  ?  Had  she  come 
to  hate  the  Union  less?  The  South  less?  Was  she  any  better 
satisfied  to  remain  in  the  Union  ?  Any  less  anxious  to  break  it  to 
pieces?  Had  she  ceased  to  believe  in  State's  sovereignty?  In  the 
right  of  States  to  secede  ?  Yet,  in  the  face  of  the  above  evidence, 
Mr.  E.  P.  Powell  calmly  announces  that  after  "New  England's 
shameless  conduct  during  the  second  war  with  Great  Britain  she 
became  of  the  faithful  the  most  faithful  to  the  Union." 

Was  Mr.  Powell  afraid  to  tell  the  plain  truth? 

A  few  extracts  from  the  utterances  of  distinguished  Repub- 
licans will  show  how  they  hated  and  detested  the  United  States 
Constitution. 

In  a  speech  to  a  large  audience,  Wendell  Phillips  cried  out : 

"The  Constitution  is  a  mistake  !    Tear  it  to  pieces !    Our 

aim  is  disunion !" 

Hincle,  a  RepubHcan  speaker,  cried  out  in  high  scorn : 

"The  United  States  Constitution !  I  would  blow  it  away 
as  a  child  blows  a  feather!" 

At  a  meeting  in  Faneuil  Hall,  January  23d,  1850,  it  was — 

"Resolved,  That  we  seek  a  dissolution  of  the  Union  ;  and 
Resolved,  That  we  do  hereby  declare  ourselves  the  enemies  of 
the  Constitution,  of  the  Union,  and  of  the  Government  of  the 
United  States ;  and  Resolved,  That  we  proclaim  it  as  our  un- 
alterable purpose  and  determination  to  live  and  labor  for 
the  dissolution  of  the  present  Union." 

The  Boston  Daily  Mail,  the  New  York  Independent,  the 
New  York  Herald,  the  Boston  Times,  and  other  papers,  reported 


146  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 

these  meetings  and  the  speeches ;  some  papers  condemned,  some 
gibed,  some  called  the  speakers  foolish  fanatics,  and  dismissed 
the  whole  proceeding  as  absurd,  but,  so  far  as  I  can  discover,  not 
a  paper  called  these  men  rebels,  traitors,  or  their  teachings  trea- 
son. 

At  a  meeting  in  Boston,  May,  1849,  Wendell  Phillips  blazed 
out  in  these  words : 

"We  confess  that  we  intend  to  trample  on  the  Constitu- 
tion of  this  country.  We  of  New  England  are  not  a  law-abid- 
ing community.  God  be  thanked  for  it !    We  are  disunionists  ; 
we  want  to  get  rid  of  this  Union."   (Democratic  Handbook, 
page  J2.) 

At  South  Farmington,  on  July  5th,  1854,  the  United  States 
Constitution  was  publicly  burned. 

Mr.  Seward  despised  the  Constitution  and  called  it  a  paper 
kite. 

Beecher  jeeringly  called  the  Constitution  a  sheep-skin  Govern- 
ment. 

May  16,  1863,  resolutions  passed  by  the  Essex  County  mass- 
meeting  contained  this : 

"Resolved,  That  the  war  prosecuted  to  preserve  a  Union 
and  a  Constitution  which  should  never  have  existed  and 
which  should  be  at  once  overthrown,  is  but  a  wanton  waste 
of  property  and  a  dreadful  sacrifice  of  human  life." 

Horace  Greeley  said: 

"All  nations  have  their  superstitions ;  that  of  our  people 
is  the  Constitution." 

Henry  Ward  Beecher  said  : 

"A  great  many  people  raise  a  cry  about  the  Union  and 
the  Constitution.  The  truth  is,  it  is  the  Constitution  that  is  the 
trouble ;  the  Constitution  has  been  the  foundation  of  our 
trouble." 

The  Boston  Liberator,  April  24,  1863,  said: 

"No  act  of  ours  do  we  regard  with  higher  satisfaction 
than  when  several  years  ago,  on  the  4th  of  July,  in  the  pres- 
ence of  a  great  assembly,  we  committed  to  the  flames  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States  and  burned  it  to  ashes." 

During  Garfield's  campaign,  that  outspoken  Republican 
paper,  the  Lemars  (la.)  Sentinel,  voiced  Republican  principles  as 
follows : 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  147 

"The  Stalwarts  do  not  care  a  fig  for  the  Constitution,  and 
will  trample  it  under  foot  today  as  did  Lincoln  and  the  Union 
hosts  from  '61  to  '65. 

"The  Constitution  of  the  United  States  has  been  little 
beside  a  curse  and  a  hindrance.  It  is  so  today  as  much  as 
it  has  been  at  any  time  since  it  was  framed.  It  is  the  barrier 
now  to  the  pathway  of  the  nation." 

The  Wakefield  (Kansas)  Semi-Weekly,  a  Republican  paper, 
in  August,  1880,  wanted  to  destroy  the  Constitution, 

"Let  us,"  (said  the  Semi-Weekly)  "tear  up  the  present 
Constitution  by  the  roots,  wipe  out  the  same  and  the  laws 
and  so-called  Constitutions  of  every  State  in  this  Union.  Let 
the  Stalwarts  now  make  their  grand  attack  on  the  United 
States  Senate,  which  is  the  bulwark  of  State  sovereignty." 

Seward  despised  the  Constitution,  but  was  careful  not  to 
proclaim  it  to  the  people.    Seward  said  to  General  Piatt : 

"We  are  all  bound  by  tradition  to  the  tail  end  of  a 
paper  kite  called  the  Constitution.    It  is  held  up  by  a  string." 

"Why,  Mr.  Senator,"  said  Piatt,  in  some  heat,  "you  don't 
believe  that  of  our  Constitution?" 

"I  certainly  do,"  replied  Seward,  "but  I  generally  keep 
it  to  myself.  Our  Constitution  is  to  us  of  the  North  a  great 
danger.    The  Southerners  are  using  it  as  a  shield." 

The  Constitution  was  a  shield  on  which  the  South  relied,  but 
the  Republican  party  overwhelmed  the  people  who  held  that 
shield  before  their  breasts ;  seized  that  shield,  dashed 
it  on  the  ground  and  trampled  it  down  in  the  bloody  mire  of 
battlefields.  Lincoln,  like  all  Republicans  had  no  respect  for  the 
Constitution,  but  Lincoln  was  always  tou  shrewd  a  lawyer  to  make 
public  his  real  opinions.  General  Piatt  relates  the  following  storj, 
which  illustrates  Lincoln's  want  of  reverence  for  the  Constitution. 
When  Amasa  Walker,  a  distinguished  New  England  financier, 
thought  of  a  scheme  by  which  could  be  filled  the  Government 
treasury,  Mr.  Davis  Tailor  went  to  Secretary  Chase  and  laid  be- 
fore him  Amasa  Walker's  scheme.  Chase  heard  him  to  the  end 
and  then  said : 

"That  is  all  very  well,  Mr.  Tailor,  but  there  is  one  little 

obstacle  in  the  way  which  makes  the  plan  impracticable,  and 

that  is  the  United  States  Constitution." 

Mr.  Tailor  then  went  to  President  Lincoln  and  laid  the  matter 
before  him. 


148  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 

"Tailor,"  said  Lincoln,  "go  back  to  Chase  and  tell  him 
not  to  bother  himself  about  the  United  States  Constitution. 
Say  that  I  have  that  sacred  instrument  here  at  the  White 
House,  and  I  am  guarding  it  with  great  care." 

Chase,  Tailor  and  Lincoln  then  held  a  conference.  Chase 
explained  how  the  scheme  to  raise  money  was  a  violation  of  the 
Constitution.  Lincoln,  after  his  usual  habit,  swept  away  Chase's 
statement  of  facts  by  a  story : 

"Chase,"  said  Lincoln,  "down  in  IlHnois  I  was  held  to  be 
a  pretty  good  lawyer ;  now  this  thing  reminds  me  of  a  story. 
An  Italian  captain  run  his  vessel  on  a  rock  and  knocked  a 
hole  in  her  bottom.  He  set  his  men  to  pumping  and  went 
to  prayers  before  a  figure  of  the  Virgin  Mary  in  the  bow  of 
the  ship.  The  leak  gained  on  them  until  it  looked  as  if  the 
vessel  would  go  down  with  all  on  board.  Then  the  captain, 
in  a  fit  of  rage  at  not  having  his  prayers  answered,  seized  the 
figure  of  the  Virgin  Mary  and  threw  it  overboard.  Suddenly 
the  leak  stopped,  the  water  was  pumped  out  and  the  vessel 
got  safely  into  port.  When  docked  for  repairs  the  statue  of 
the  Virgin  Mary  was  found  stuck  head  foremost  in  the  hole." 

Chase,  who  never  liked  Lincoln's  stories,  told  the  President 
he  did  not  see  the  application  of  the  story. 

"Why,  Chase,"  returned  Lincoln,  "I  didn't  intend  pre- 
cisely to  throw  the  Virgin  Mary  overboard — by  that  I  mean 
the  Constitution — But  I  will  stick  it  into  the  hole  if  I  can." 
And  he  did  stick  it  in  the  hole.     The  Iowa  editor  told  the 
tale  more  tersely,  when  he  admiringly  said : 

"Abraham  Lincoln  kicked  the  Constitution  into  the 
Capitol  cellar,  and  there  it  remained  innocuous  until  the  war 
ended." 

When  the  bill  for  dismembering  Virginia  was  up  for  consider- 
ation Thaddeus  Stevens  gave  vent  to  his  respect  for  the  Consti- 
tution as  follows : 

"I  will  not  stultify  myself  by  supposing  that  we  have 
any  warrant  in  the  Constitution  for  this  proceeding.  This 
talk  of  restoring  the  Union  as  it  was  under  the  Constitution 
is  one  of  the  absurdities  repeated  until  I  have  become  sick  of 
it.  This  Union  shall  never  be  restored,  with  my  consent, 
under  the  Constitution  as  it  is." 

As  its  progenitors,  the  Federals  of  1796,  had  believed  in  the 
right  of  secession,  so  did  their  legitimate  offspring,  the  Repub- 


Chap.  21  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  149 

lican  party,  born  in  1854,  believe  in  secession  from  the  day  of 
its  birth.  The  highest  orators  of  that  party  pubHcly  declared  such 
belief.  Even  before  the  organization  of  the  Republican  party,  Mr. 
Lincoln  proclaimed  his  faith  in  the  right  of  secession.  On  the 
13th  day  of  January,  1848,  from  the  floor  of  Congress,  Mr.  Lin- 
coln declared  for  the  right  of  States  to  secede  from  the  Union. 

"Any  people  anywhere,"  said  Mr.  Lincoln,  "being  in- 
clined and  having  the  power,  have  the  right  to  rise  up  and 
shake  off  the  existing  government  and  to  form  one  that 
suits  them  better.  Nor  is  this  right  confined  to  cases  in 
which  the  people  of  an  existing  government  may  choose  to 
exercise  it.  Any  portion  of  such  people  that  can,  may  make 
their  own  of  such  territory  as  they  inhabit.  More  than  this, 
a  majority  of  any  portion  of  such  people  may  revolutionize, 
putting  down  a  minority  intermingling  with  or  near  them 
who  oppose  their  movements. — Appendix  to  Congressional 
Globe,  1st  Session  30th  Congress,  page  94. 

These  words  ring  with  the  spirit  of  1776.  The  South's  seces- 
sion fulfilled  every  requirement  laid  down  by  Lincoln.  The  South 
had  the  right  and  she  exercised  it  with  decency  and  dignity.  She 
did  not  rise  up  and  shake  off  the  Union  Government  in  a  turbulent 
manner ;  she  quietly  withdrew.  She  did  not.  as  New  England  did 
in  1 814,  select  a  time  to  withdraw  when  it  might  endanger  the 
Union.  She  bade  her  old  political  associates  a  sorrowful  farewell. 
She  assured  them  of  her  desire  to  remain  at  peace,  and  respect- 
fully asked  them  to  make  a  just  settlement  of  their  partnership 
affairs.  Buchanan  received  those  overtures  in  a  friendly  spirit ; 
so  did  the  great  body  of  the  North's  people.  How  did  Lincoln 
receive  them?  For  six  weeks  Lincoln  and  Seward  pursued  an 
ambiguous,  deceitful  course ;  they  did  not  take  the  people  of  the 
North  into  their  confidence ;  they  strove  to  deceive ;  they  made 
speeches  now  looking  toward  war,  now  toward  peace.  Lincoln 
afterward  said  the  hardest  work  he  ever  did  was  making  these 
speeches  intended  to  deceive.  Not  until  Lincoln  was  ready  to 
strike  the  first  blow  of  war  did  he  cry  out  to  the  South,  "Rebel ! 
Traitor !"  When  he  called  for  75,000  armed  men  on  the  pretense 
of  defending  his  Capitol,  he  falsely  asserted  and  deceived  the 
people  of  the  North  into  the  belief  that  the  South  was  eager  for 
war,  and  intended  to  invade  the  North.  Lincoln's  war  on  the 
South  began  with  falsehoods  and  was  run  on  falsehoods  to  the 
bitter  end. 


ISO 


Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     21 


In   the   court   of  posterity   how   will   this    dissimulation   be 

judged? 

In  "Recollections  of  Lincoln"  Lamon  says  of  his  journey 

from  Springfield  to  Washington : 

"Mr.  Lincoln's  speeches  were  the  absorbing  topic  of 
the  hour.  The  people  everywhere  were  eager  to  hear  a 
forecast  of  his  policy,  and  he  was  eager  to  keep  silence.  After 
having  been  en  route  a  day  or  two  he  told  me  he  had  done 
much  hard  work  in  his  life,  but  to  make  speeches  day  after  day 
with  the  object  of  speaking  and  saying  nothing,  was  the 
hardest  work  he  had  ever  done." — Lamon's  Recollections  of 
Lincoln,  page  34. 

At  no  period  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  presidency  was  he  candid  and 

sincere  to  the  people.     It  was  his  nature  to  trick  and  deceive. 

Imperial  Republicans  of  to-day  laud  and  admire  this  trait  in  his 

character.    They  praise  his  ability  to  use  the  fox's  skin  when  the 

lion's  was  too  short. 

Senator  Wade  of  Ohio  was  one  of  the  highest  lights  in  the 

Republican  party.     Wade,  as  emphatically  as  Lincoln  had  done, 

declared  the  right  of  secession,   December  4th,    1856,   from   the 

Senate  floor  Senator  Wade  of  Ohio  proclaimed  the  South's  right 

to  secede  as  follows  : 

"I  am  not  one,"  said  Senator  Wade,  "to  ask  the  South  to 
continue  in  such  a  Union  as  this.  It  would  be  doing  violence 
to  the  platform  of  the  party  to  which  I  belong.  We  have 
adopted  the  old  Declaration  of  Independence  as  the  basis 
of  our  political  movement,  which  declares  that  any  people, 
when  their  government  ceases  to  protect  their  rights,  have 
the  right  to  recur  to  original  principles,  and  if  need  be  to 
destroy  the  government  under  which  they  live,  and  to  erect 
on  its  ruins  another  conducive  to  their  welfare.  I  hold  that 
the  people  of  the  South  have  this  right.  I  will  not  blame 
any  people  for  exercising  this  right  whenever  they  think  the 
contingency  has  come.  You  can  not  forcibly  hold  men  in 
the  Union,  for  the  attempt  to  do  so  would  subvert  the  first 
principles  of  the  Government  under  which  we  live. — Con. 
Globe,  3d  Session  34th  Congress,  page  25. 

In  all  the  long  and  woeful  story  of  man's  treachery  to  man 
is  there  an  instance  of  treachery  blacker  than  this  of  which  the 
Republican  party  was  guilty  in  the  6o's?  For  more  than  60  years 
that  party,  first  as  Federals  then  as  Republicans,  had  preached 
and  prayed  for  secession,  had  urged  the  South  to  secede,  had 


Chap.  22  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  151 

invited  the  South  to  aid  it  to  break  the  Union  asunder,  had  hated 
and  denounced  the  Union  as  a  covenant  with  hell,  yet,  when  at 
last  the  Southern  people,  to  escape  the  hate  so  long  poured  upon 
them,  peacefully,  quietly  withdrew  from  the  Union,  that  same 
Republican  party  turned  on  them  with  a  fury,  a  vindictive  ferocity, 
a  hellish  animosity,  not  even  savage  and  enraged  tigers  could 
surpass. 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

Republicans  Ascend  to  Power.  Lincoln  and  Scivard  Make 
Ambiguous  Speeches.  Webster  Davis  on  the  Atvful  Car- 
nage of  the  War.  Seward's  Remarkable  Letter  to  Lincoln. 
Nicolav  and  Hay  Comment  on  Sezvard's  Letter.  A  Moral 
Pervert. 

The  reader  must  bear  in  mind  that  in  i860  there  were  three 
Presidential  candidates  in  the  field.  Lincoln  was  a  sectional  can- 
didate and  a  minority  President.  Of  the  4,700,000  votes  cast  the 
Republican  party  only  got  1,850,000.  Of  these  1,850,000,  the 
greater  number  did  not  want  Lincoln.  Seward  or  Chase  was 
th.'ir  leal  choice.  Lincoln  had  only  been  affiliated  with  th?  party 
two  \ears.  Eastern  Republicans  knew  little  if  anythin,^  of  L.in- 
coln.  What  little  they  did  know  they  did  not  like  or  adn;ire.  It 
was  said  at  the  time,  and  is  still  said  by  the  knowing,  that  a 
blunder  of  Thurlow  Weed's  lost  the  prize  to  Seward  and  threw  it 
at  the  feet  of  Lincoln.  Hence  during  Lincoln's  life  Republicans 
called  h'm  "His  Accidency,"  not  His  Excellency.  Holland's  Life 
of  Lincoln,  published  1865,  seems  to  have  been  written  to  serve 
two  purposes;  ist,  to  bolster  up  the  apotheosis  theory  of  Lin- 
coln's divinity ;  2nd,  to  laud  and  glorify  the  Republican  party. 
Holland  never  permits  a  fact  to  stand  in  the  way  of  any  pretty  or 
pleasing  falsehood  he  may  wish  to  use,  yet  he  sometimes  records 
facts  worth  remembering.     Instance  the  following: 

"During  the  first  month  of  Lincoln's  presidencv  he  was 
Thronged  with  office  .'cc-kers,  and  was  holding  protracted 
Cabinet  meetings.  All  these  labors  were  performed  with  con- 
sciousness that  his  nominal  friends  (men  of  his  own  party), 
as  well  as  the  great  majority  of  the  people  throughout  the 
Union,  had  not  the  slightest  sympathy  with  him.  There  was 
distraction  even  in  his  councils." 

From  this  is  seen  that  not  only  the  great  majority  of  the 
people  throughout  the  L^nion,  but  the  men  in  Lincoln's  own  party, 


152  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     22 

even  in  his  Cabinet,  were  opposed  to  Lincoln's  war  schemes. 
McCkire,  Greeley,  Xicolay  and  Hay,  and  many  other  Republican 
writers  bear  testimony  to  the  almost  universal  opposition  to  war 
in  the  Xorthem  States.  Lincoln  and  Seward  for  a  time  were  the 
only  members  of  the  Cabinet  eager  to  begin  war.  During  the  first 
month  of  Lincoln's  presidency,  after  the  Cabinet  members  dis- 
covered that  Lincoln  was  fixed  in  his  detennination  to  begin  war. 
the  question  was  discussed  at  what  point  should  it  begin.  Seward 
opposed  beginning  at  Fort  Sumter ;  he  wanted  to  strike  the  first 
blow  on  the  gulf  at  Pensacola. 

Hapgood  says  the  Xew  York  Tribune,  New  York  Herald, 
and  many  other  papers  representing  different  parties  in  the  North- 
ern States,  as  well  as  in  the  middle,  in  2\Iassachusetts  and  Boston 
itself,  at  first  opposed  war  on  the  South,  and  boldly  declared  that 
the  South  had  acted  on  her  rights.  Hapgood  seems  to  be  ignorant 
of  the  fact  that  the  Republican  part}-  itself  was  a  secession  part}', 
and  for  over  t^venty  years  had  zealously  worked  for  disunion. 

Chase  said:  "Dissolution  of  the  L'nion  is  better  than  a 
conflict.  I  will  oppose  any  attempt  to  reinforce  Sumter  if  it 
means  war." 

Seward  said  in  the  Cabinet: 

"Even  preparation  to  reinforce  will  precipitate  war." 

Gideon  Wells,  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  was  weak  on  this  ques- 
tion. Of  all  his  Cabinet,  Lincoln  only  found  Blair  in  favor  of  re- 
inforcing Sumter. 

There  was  not  a  man  in  the  Cabinet  that  did  not  know  that 
the  attempt  to  reinforce  Sumter  would  be  the  first  blow  of  war. 

A  few  blood-thirst>-  leaders  of  the  Republican  part}-  had 
entered  into  a  conspiracy  to  force  war  on  the  countrv-  at  any  and 
every  cost,  despite  the  opposition  of  the  great  majorit}'  of  people 
in  the  Northern  States,  and  despite  the  South's  pleas  for  peace. 

Februar}-  2d,  1861,  Mr.  Stephen  Douglas,  in  a  letter  published 
in  the  ^^lemphis  Appeal,  wrote  of  the  Republican  leaders  as  fol- 
lows : 

"They  are  bold,  determined  men.  Thev  are  striving  to 
break  up  the  Union  under  the  pretense  of  preserving  it. 
They  are  struggling  to  overthrow  the  Constitution  while 
professing  undying  attachment  to  it,  and  a  willingness  to 
make  any  sacrifice  to  maintain  it.  They  are  trying  to  plunge 
the  countr}-  into  a  cruel  war  as  the  surest  means  of  destroying 
the  Union  upon  the  plea  of  enforcing  the  laws  and  protecting 
public  propert}\" 


Chap.  22  Facts  ant)  F.^lsehoods.  153 

Shortly  after  Douglas  wrote  the  above  letter.  Senator  Zack 
Chandler  of  Michigan  wrote  a  letter  to  Governor  Austin  Blair, 
which  proves  the  guilt}-  conspiracy  of  the  men  determined  on 
war.  Virginia  had  solicited  a  conference  of  States  to  see  if  some 
plan  could  not  be  devised  and  agreed  on  to  prevent  war  and  save 
the  Union.  Chandler  wrote  Governor  Blair  that  he  opposed  the 
conference,  and  no  Republican  State  should  send  a  delegate.  He 
implored  Governor  Blair  to  send  stiff-backed  delegates  or  none, 
as  the  whole  thing  was  against  his  judgment  Chandler  added 
to  his  letter  these  sinister  w^ords: 

"Some  of  the  manufacturing  States  think  that  a  war 
would  be  awful ;  without  a  little  blood-letting  this  Union  will 
not  be  worth  a  curse." — Carpenter's  Logic  of  Histor}-,  page 

138. 

Assistant  Secretar\"  of  the  Interior  Webster  Da\-is,  in  an 
oration  on  Decoration  Day  at  Arlington,  said: 

"Counting  the  men  who  fell  in  battles  and  received 
wounds  not  mortal  at  the  moment,  but  who  died  afterward 
from  these  wounds.  700.000  soldiers  who  wore  the  blue  died 
of  that  awful  war." 

These  700.000  men  in  blue  were  sacrificed  on  the  pretext  of 
defending  the  flag  and  sa\-ing  the  Union. 

Both  pretexts  were  impudent  falsehoods.  Not  a  man  in  the 
Republican  party  respected  the  flag.  Both  union  and  flag  were 
scorned  and  hated  by  Republicans.  The  Xew  York  Tribune  was 
in  the  habit  of  adorning  its  columns  with  doggerel  deriding  the 
flag.     For  example: 

Tear  down  the  flaimting  lie ; 

Half  mast  the  stany  flag : 
Insult  no  sunny  sky 

Witli  Hate's  polluted  rag. 

Is.  there  a  flag  on  earth  worth  the  sacrifice  of  700,000  lives, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  anguish  of  hearts  left  behind  to  mourn  over 
the  sacrifice  ? 

No  man  acquainted  with  the  history  of  the  Republican  party 
can  for  one  moment  doubt  tliat,  from  the  day  of  its  organization 
in  1854  to  the  hour  Fort  Sumter  was  fired  on.  Republicans  had 
striven  might  and  main  to  dissolve  the  Union.  In  \-iew  of  this 
indisputable  fact,  what  will  Posterity  think  of  the  tricker>',  the 
cunning,  tlie  mean  and  base  deception  of  Republican  offi- 
cials, who  inaugurated  and  for  four  years  waged  the  most  cruel 


154  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     22 

war  ever  fought  between  English-speaking  people  on  the  flimsy 
pretext  of  saving  the  Union? 

During  the  first  month  of  Lincoln's  presidency  he  was  busy 
looking  after  office-seekers.  Xot  a  step  did  he  take  toward  war. 
Seward,  the  man  utterly  callous  to  human  suffering,  became  im- 
patient to  begin  war,  not  only  with  the  South,  but  with  two  Euro- 
pean kingdoms  as  well.  Tremendous  war  schemes  brooded  in 
Seward's  brain.  Exulting  in  the  possession  of  power,  Seward  was 
eager  to  use  it  for  the  destruction  and  misery  of  his  fellow-mortals. 
At  the  end  of  the  first  month,  unable  longer  to  bear  the  quiet  of 
peace,  Seward  longed  to  plunge  this  country,  as  well  as  two 
European  countries,  into  a  sea  of  human  blood.  To  hurry  up 
Lincoln,  Seward  wrote  a  carefully  prepared  paper  intended  for 
Lincoln's  eye  only.  We  give  this  singular  document  verbatim. 
It  was  headed — 

"Some  Thoughts  for  the  President's  Consideration." 

"First,"  wrote  Seward,  "we  are  at  the  end  of  a  month's 
administration  and  yet  without  a  policy. 

"Second.  This,  however,  is  not  culpable,  it  has  been  un- 
avoidable. The  presence  of  the  Senate  with  the  need  to 
meet  applications  for  patronage  have  prevented  attention  to 
other  and  more  gfrave  matters. 

"Third.  Rut  further  delay  to  adopt  and  prosecute  our 
policy  for  both  domestic  and  foreign  affairs,  would  not  only 
bring  scandal  on  the  administration,  but  danger  on  the 
country. 

"Fourth.  To  do  this  we  must  dismiss  the  applicr^nts  for 
office,  but,  how?  I  suggest  that  we  make  the  local  appoint- 
ments forthwith,  leaving  foreign  or  general  ones  for  ulterior 
and  occasional  action. 

"Fifth.  The  policy  at  home.  My  system  is  built  on  this 
idea  as  a  ruling  one,  viz :  That  we  must  change  the  question 
before  the  public  from  one  upon  slavery  or  about  slavery, 
to  a  question  of  Union  or  Disunion.  In  other  words,  from 
what  would  be  regarded  as  a  party  question,  to  one  of  Patriot- 
ism or  Union.  The  occupation  and  evacuation  of  Fort  Sum- 
ter although  not  in  fact  a  slavery  or  party  question  is  so  re- 
garded. Witness  the  temper  manifested  by  the  Republicans 
of  the  Northern  States,  and  by  the  LInion  men  in  the  South. 
For  the  rest  I  would  simultaneously  defend  and  reinforce  all 
the  Forts  in  the  gulf,  and  have  the  Navy  recalled  from  foreign 


Chap.  22  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  155 

stations  to  be  prepared  for  a  blockade.  Put  the  Island  of 
Key  West  under  martial  law.  This  will  raise  distinctly  the 
question  of  Union  or  Disunion.  I  would  maintain  every  fort 
and  Federal  possession  in  the  South.  I  would  at  once  de- 
mand explanations  from  France  and  Spain  categorically.  I 
would  demand  explanations  from  Great  Britain  and  Russia, 
and  send  agents  into  Canada,  Mexico,  and  Central  America, 
to  rouse  a  vigorous  Continental  spirit  of  Independence  on 
this  continent  against  European  intervention.  And  if  satis- 
factory explanations  are  not  received  from  Spain  and  France, 
I  would  convene  Congress  and  declare  war  against  them. 
For  this  reason  it  must  be  somebody's  business  to  pursue  and 
direct  it  incessantly.  Either  the  President  must  do  it  and  be 
all  the  while  actively  in  it,  or  devolve  it  on  some  member  of 
his  cabinet.  Once  adopted  debates  must  end  and  all  agree 
and  abide.  It  is  not  my  especial  province,  but  I  neither  seek 
to  evade  or  assume  responsibilitv. 

"WM.  H.  SEWARD." 

It  does  not  appear  that  this  letter  of  Seward's  was  ever  laid 
before  the  Cabinet.  It  does  not  appear  that  his  proposal  to  pick 
a  quarrel  with  France  and  Spain,  and  make  war  on  those  two 
countries  as  well  as  on  the  South,  was  ever  discussed  in  the  Cab- 
inet. The  evidence  goes  to  show  that  Seward  gave  the  letter  to 
Lincoln  for  his  private  consideration  only,  and  that  Lincoln  said 
nothing  about  it,  but  accepted  the  advice  to  drop  their  party's 
issue.  Slavery,  and  in  its  place  put  the  issue.  "Save  the  Union." 
He  rejected  the  advice  to  seek  a  quarrel  with  and  make  war  on 
France  and  Spain.  No  act  of  Lincoln's  and  Seward's  lives  shows 
a  more  autocratic  spirit  than  the  way  they  turned  down  their 
party's  issue  and  set  up  an  issue  their  party  hated.  Both  Lincoln 
and  Seward  were  creatures  of  the  Republican  party,  put  in  office 
by  Republican  votes,  yet  in  the  very  outset  of  their  official  career 
they  offered  the  grossest  possible  insult  to  that  party  by  spurning 
its  most  cherished  issue,  slavery,  and  putting  in  its  place  the 
Union,  a  thing  their  party  had  ever  despised,  hated,  and  de- 
nounced from  a  thousand  rostrums. 

In  Nicolay  and  Hay's  Life  of  Lincoln,  Vol.  3,  page  440,  we 
find  this  comment  on  Seward's  letter: 

"On  April  ist,  1861,  Seward  made  Lincoln  a  proposi- 
tion to  turn  his  back  on  the  party  which  had  put  him  into 
office,  and  by  certain  arbitrary  acts  he  would  plunge  the 
country  mto  foreign  wars,  and  asked  Lincoln  to  invite  him 


156  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     22 

(Seward)  to  manage  all  this,  to  bring  on  the  wars  and  carry 
them  on." 

Nicolay  and  Hay  seemed  to  perceive  something  of  the  stu- 
pendous crime  and  the  egregious  folly  involved  in  Seward's  prop- 
osition to  plunge  the  country  into  war  with  two  unoffending 
kingdoms  of  Europe,  but  neither  of  these  two  men  seemed,  even 
dimlv  to  perceive  the  equally  stupendous  crime  of  forcing  a  con- 
flict between  the  people  of  the  Northern  and  the  people  of  the 
Southern  States,  both  peoples  at  that  time  feeling  kindly  toward 
each  other,  both  anxious  to  avoid  war,  both  loving  peace,  believing 
there  was  no  just  cause  for  war.  Nicolay  and  Hay  were  ready 
enough  to  condemn  Seward  for  inviting  Lincoln  to  turn  his  back 
on  his  party's  isue,  slavery,  and  to  take  up  an  issue,  the  Union, 
which  his  party  had  hated  from  the  day  of  its  organization,  but 
not  one  word  of  blame  have  these  two  apotheosizing  men  for 
Lincoln,  who  so  readily  accepted  Seward's  advice  on  the  issue 
question  and  his  advice  to  begin  war  on  the  South,  but  rejected 
the  advice  to  pick  a  quarrel  with  and  declare  war  on  France  and 
Spain.  Nicolay  and  Hay  were  two  young  men  of  Springfield, 
Illinois,  who,  when  Lincoln  went  to  Washington  city,  accom- 
panied him  thither,  and  were  Lincoln's  private  secretaries  until 
his  death.  In  1890,  twenty-five  years  after  Lincoln's  death,  these 
two  men  jointly  concocted  ten  large  volumes,  which  they  labeled 
"The  Life  of  Lincoln,"  and  dedicated  to  Robert  Lincoln,  the  dead 
President's  son.  As  the  whole  work  seems  to  have  been  gotten 
up  under  the  influence  of  the  apotheosis  ceremony,  more  for  the 
purpose  of  glorifying  the  deified  dead  President  than  to  show  him 
to  the  public  as  he  was  in  life,  a  more  appropriate  title  would  be 
A  Ten  Volume  Monument  to  the  Deified  Lincoln. 

The  reader  should  here  pause  and  carefully  consider  Sew- 
ard's letter  to  Lincoln.  Look  at  its  items  one  by  one,  consider 
the  fact  that  Seward  had  long  been  an  honored  and  trusted  mem- 
ber of  the  Republican  party,  whose  votes  had  put  him  and  Lin- 
coln into  power ;  consider  the  fact  that  the  darling  desire  of  his 
party  had  ever  been  to  sever  the  Union  in  twain,  that  to  free 
slaves  was  its  war  cry,  its  hobby.  Consider  the  insult  to  his 
party,  the  treachery  to  party  principles,  the  outrage  to  party  feel- 
ings, involved  in  Seward's  proposal  to  cast  aside  as  a  useless  rag 
his  party's  banner  blazoned  with  the  mottoes  they  loved,  "Free 
Slaves !  Down  with  the  Union !"  and  in  their  place  put  the  motto, 
"Save  the  Union !"  A  thing  which  stunk  in  their  nostrils.  Save 
a  thing  they  had  ever  hated?  Save  the  thing  whose  destruction 
they  had  prayed  for,  labored  for,  since  their  party's  birth  ?    What 


Chap.  22  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  157 

induced  Seward  and  Lincoln  to  take  this  ungrateful,  this  insulting 
course  toward  their  own  party?  The  reasons  are  not  hard  to 
find ;  they  lie  on  the  surface,  to  be  seen  by  all  with  eyes  to  set 
and  judgments  to  understand.  Lincoln  and  Seward  were  of  the 
nature  to  revel  in  the  use  of  power.  To  be  commanders  and  dic- 
tators of  a  great  war  would  greatly  enhance  their  power.  Deter- 
mined to  make  war,  yet  finding  that  the  great  body  of  the  North- 
ern people  had  set  their  faces  as  flints  against  a  war  based  on 
the  slavery  issue,  these  two  men,  the  one  keenly  astute,  the  other 
with  a  "cunning  that  was  genius,"  both  destitute  of  moral  scru- 
ples, both  with  hearts  of  stone,  for  one  month  pondered  over  the 
situation.  The  people  w^ould  not  support  a  war  based  on  slavery ; 
the  problem  they  had  to  solve  was  by  what  means  could  they  rouse 
the  peace-loving  people  of  the  North  to  the  fury  of  war?  They 
saw  but  one  way,  and  that  was  to  turn  their  backs  on  their  own 
party,  cast  that  party's  issue  to  the  dogs,  set  up  the  word  "Union" 
as  a  god  to  fight  and  die  for,  and  make  the  Northern  people  be- 
lieve the  South  intended  a  war  of  invasion  on  their  States,  on 
their  Union  Government.  Imperialists  always  look  on  the  peo- 
ple as  sheep,  to  be  deceived  and  driven.  Alas !  in  this  case  the 
people  were  indeed  deceived  and  driven  into  war,  and  700,000 
men  who  wore  the  blue  were  sacrificed  on  the  altar  of  that  false 
god,  the  Union.  The  scheme  was  successfully  carried  out,  the 
people  of  the  North  were  tricked,  the  people  of  the  South  forced 
into  war.  In  all  the  black  history  of  man's  treachery  to  man,  I 
know  of  nothing  more  damnable  than  this.  The  arguments  Sew- 
ard used  in  his  letter  to  Lincoln  are  as  foolish  as  they  are  false. 

"Delay,"  wrote  Seward,  "to  prosecute  our  policy  (the 
policy  of  war)  will  not  only  bring  scandal  on  the  adminis- 
tration, but  danger  to  the  country." 

As  war  is  the  greatest  evil  that  can.  befall  a  people,  except 
dishonor,  how  could  delay  in  bringing  that  evil  bring  scandal 
and  danger?  The  scandal  and  danger  was  in  bringing  the  zvar, 
not  in  the  delay  of  bringing  it.  Seward  and  Lincoln  had  not 
been  elected  to  bring  war  on  the  people ;  the  people  did  not  want 
war.  From  what  source,  then,  could  the  danger  come?  Certainlv 
not  from  the  South.  The  South  was  pleading  for  peace.  Se- 
cession had  been  an  accomplished  fact  for  months  before  Lincoln 
took  his  seat  in  the  Presidential  chair.  There  was  not  the  faint- 
est shadow  of  danger  in  that  direction.  Would  the  reader  like 
to  understand  the  mental  and  moral  traits  of  the  man  who  wrote 
that  remarkable  letter  to  Lincoln?      General     Piatt,  a  personal 


158  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     22 

friend  and  great  admirer  of  Seward,  in  1887    sketched  his  char- 
acter thus : 

"Seward  begun  life  as  a  school  teacher  in  the  South. 
He  had  been  treated  with  condescending  indifference  by  the 
unenhghtened  masters,  which  treatment  he  never  forgot.  ( Was 
it  spite  that  made  Seward  so  vindictive  toward  the  Southern 
people?)  "Seward,"  continued  Piatt,  "looked  down  on  the 
white  men  of  the  South  in  the  same  cynical  way  that  he  did 
upon  the  slaves.  He  had  no  pity  for  the  slaves,  and  no  dis- 
like for  the  master.  He  was  a  great  favorite  with  the  last 
named.  He  had  contempt  for  them,  which  he  concealed  as 
carefully  as  he  did  his  contempt  for  the  United  States  Con- 
stitution. Seward  had  trained  himself  to  believe  that  world- 
ly wickedness  indicated  ability.  He  thought  to  be  bad  was 
to  be  clever.  He  thought  that  devotion  to  wine,  women 
and  infidelity  gave  proof  of  superior  intelligence.  He  affect- 
ed a  wickedness  he  did  not  feel,  because  such  wickedness, 
in  his  estimation,  was  good   form." 

In  presenting  to  the  public  this  picture  of  his  friend,  Gen- 
eral Piatt  seems  to  have  had  no  suspicion  that  he  was  writing 
down  that  friend  as  a  moral  degenerate,  a  mental  pervert.  No 
mentally  and  morally  sound  man  can  possibly  believe  that  "zvick- 
edness  indicates  mental  ability,"  or  that  "devotion  to  zvine,  zvomen 
and  infidelity  gives  proof  of  a  superior  intelligence."  Everyone 
knows  when  men  talk  of  devotion  to  wine  and  women  they  mean 
devotion  to  drink  and  prostitutes,  not  to  the  honest  wives,  moth- 
ers and  daughters  in  the  land.  Yet  to  this  moral  degenerate, 
this  mental  pervert.  Lincoln  delegated  power  as  despotic  as  any 
Bourbon  King  of  old  exercised  over  his  subjects.  Lincoln  was 
as  eager  for  war  on  the  South  as  Seward.  He  made  haste  to 
drop  the  slavery  issue  and  put  in  its  place  the  Union.  The  old 
leaders  of  the  party  were  angry  enough  at  this  outrage  to  their 
party's  feelings  and  principles,  and  when  Lincoln  called  for  75,000 
men  to  fight  for  the  Union,  some  of  those  leaders  took  the  stump 
and  tried  to  prevent  enlistments.  Parker  Pillsbury,  in  a  speech, 
said  to  young  men : 

"Recognize  your  own  manhood ;  your  own  divine 
rights  and  destiny,  and  believe  yourselves  too  sacred  to  be 
shot  down  like  dogs  by  Jeff  Davis  and  his  myrmidons  ;  die 
rather  at  home  in  the  arms  of  a  loving  mother  and  sisters. 
Be  shot  down,  if  you  must,  at  home;  die  like  Christians,  and 


Chap.  23  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  159 

have  a  decent  burial,  rather  than  go  down  and  die  in  the 
cause  of  a  Union  bhstered  all  over  with  the  curses  of  God." 

Wendell  Phillips,  speaking-  of  Lincoln,  cried  out  in  high 
scorn : 

"Who  is  this  huckster  in  politics?  Who  is  this  county 
court  lawyer  ?" 

In  another  speech  Phillips  denounced  the  war  and  denounced 

"That  slave-hound  from  Illinois  !" 

In  another  speech  Phillips  denounced  the  war  and  denounced 
Lincoln  roundly. 

"Here,"  cried  Phillips,  "are  a  series  of  States  girding  the 
gulf  which  think  they  should  have  an  independent  gov- 
ernment; they  have  a  right  to  decide  that  question  without 
appealing  to  you  or  to  me.  Standing  with  the  principles 
of  '76  behind  us,  who  can  deny  them  that  right?  Abraham 
Lincoln  has  no  right  to  a  soldier  in  Fort  Sumter.  You  can- 
not go  through  Massachusetts  and  enlist  men  to  bombard 
Charleston  and  New  Orleans." 

But  not  only  did  Lincoln  go  through  Massachusetts  and 
enlist  men  to  bombard  the  cities  of  the  South,  he  soon  brought 
Wendell  Phillips  to  embrace  despotism  as  ardently  as  lover  ever 
embraced  his  bride.  He  made  Phillips  repudiate  and  spit  on  the 
principles  of  '"j^,  made  him  shout  loudest  of  all  to  the  South, 
"Rebel!  Traitor!  Rebel!  Traitor!" 

On  another  occasion  Phillips  told  his  audience  that  he  "had 
labored  for  nineteen  years  to  dissolve  the  Union,  and  now  success 
has  come  at  last."  Before  utterly  subjected  to  despotism,  in  a 
speech  Phillips  said : 

"Let  the  South  go!  Let  her  go  with  flags  flying  and 
trumpets  blowing!  Give  her  her  forts,  her  arsenals,  and 
her  sub-treasuries.  Speed  the  parting  guest!  All  hail  dis- 
union! Beautiful  on  the  mountains  are  the  feet  of  them 
who  bring  the  glad  tidings  of  disunion!" 

Not  only  did  Wendell  Phillips  voice  the  opinion  of  the  ma- 
jority of  his  own  party,  but  on  the  subject  of  war  on  the  South 
he  voiced  the  feelings  and  opinions  of  all  classes  of  men  in  the 
Northern  States.  Yet,  in  spite  of  this  immense  opposition  to  war, 
Seward  and  Lincoln,  as  Greeley  said,  "clearly  put  themselves  in 
the  wrong  and  rushed  on  carnage,"  and  not  only  did  these  men 
turn  their  backs  on  their  own  party,  but  they  turned  their  backs 


i6o  Facts  and  Falsehoods,  Chap.    23 

on  their  own  opinions,  privately  and  publicly  declared,  as  will 
be  shown  in  the  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

Sezuard's  Falsehoods.  Treachery  Blacker  than  Benedict  Arnold's. 
Lincoln  Confesses  that  He,  at  Medill's  Demand,  Made  War 
on  the  South. 

On  April  4th,  1861,  Seward  said  to  Russell,  the  London 
Times  correspondent: 

"It  would  be  contrary  to  the  spirit  of  the  American 
Government  to  use  armed  force  to  subjugate  the  South.  If 
the  people  of  the  South  want  to  stay  out  of  the  Union,  if  they 
desire  independence,  let  them  have  it." 

On  April  loth,  1861,  Seward  officially  wrote  C.  F.  Adams, 
then  Minister  to  England: 

"Only  a  despotic  and  imperial  government  can  subju- 
gate seceding  States." 

With  a  treachery  blacker  than  Benedict  Arnold's,  know- 
ingly, deliberately,  these  two  men,  Seward  and  Lincoln,  deter- 
mined to  change  the  American  Government  from  a  free  Re- 
public to  an  imperial  despotism.  During  the  first  month  of 
Lincoln's  Presidency  the  question  of  war  or  peace  was  freely 
discussed  in  the  Cabmet.  Few  members  were  in  favor  of  war. 
Chase  strongly  opposed  war.  Chase  always  had  been  a  disunion- 
ist;  he  welcomed  disunion  and  wanted  to  let  the  South  possess 
the  peace  and  independence  that  was  hers  by  right.  Not  one 
single  member  of  the  Cabinet  was  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  an 
attempt  to  reinforce  Fort  Sumter  would  be  the  first  blow  of  war. 
In  a  discussion  of  this  question  in  the  Cabinet,  Seward  said : 

"The  attempt  to  reinforce  Sumter  will  provoke  an  attack 
and  involve  war.  The  very  preparation  for  such  an  expedi- 
tion will  precipitate  war  at  that  point.  I  oppose  beginning 
war  at  that  point.  I  would  advise  against  the  expedition  to 
Charleston.  I  would  at  once,  at  ever\  cost,  prepare  for  war 
at  Pensacola  and  Texas.  I  would  instr.xt  Major  Anderson 
to  retire  from  Sumter." 

Lincoln  preferred  to  open  the  war  at  Sumter.  If  there  is 
a  man  in  America  so  ignorant  as  to  believe  the  falsehood  put 
forth  by  these  unscrupulous  men  that  the  South  began  the  war, 
that  Lincoln  was  averse  to  war,  that  he  called  for  75,000  armed 


Chap.  23  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  161 

men  to  protect  Washington  City,  let  him  consider  the  story  found 
in  Miss  Tarbell's  Life  of  Lincoln,  page  144,  Vbl.  IL,  Medill,  of 
the  Chicago  Tribune,  tells  the  story,  and  Miss  Tarbell  puts  it  in 
her  book.  It  is  a  very  valuable  item  of  history,  for  it  kills  the 
old,  old  lie  so  often  told  that  the  South  began  the  war  of  the  6o's. 

"In  1864,"  relates  Medill,  "when  the  call  for  extra  troops 
came,  Chicago  revolted.  Chicago  had  sent  22,000  and  was 
drained.  There  were  no  young  men  to  go,  no  aliens  except 
what  was  already  bought.  The  citizens  held  a  mass  meeting 
and  appointed  three  men,  of  whom  I  (Medill)  was  one,  to 
go  to  Washington  and  ask  Stanton  (the  War  Secretary) 
to  give  Cook  County  a  new  enrollment.  On  reaching  Wash- 
ington we  went  to  Stanton  with  our  statement.  He  refused. 
Then  we  went  to  President  Lincoln.  T  can  not  do  it,'  said 
Lincoln,  'but  I  will  go  with  you  to  Stanton  and  hear  the 
arguments  of  both  sides.'  So  we  all  went  over  to  the  War 
Department  together.  Stanton  and  General  Frye  were  • 
there,  and  they  both  contended  that  the  quota  should  not  be 
changed.  The  argument  went  on  for  some  time,  and  was 
finally  referred  to  Lincoln,  who  had  been  silently  listening. 
When  appealed  to,  Lincoln  turned  to  us  with  a  black  and 
frowning  face:  'Gentlemen/  he  said,  with  a  voice  full  of 
bitterness,  'after  Boston,  Chicago  has  been  the  chief  instru- 
ment in  bringing  this  war  on  the  country.  The  Northwest 
opposed  the  South,  as  New  England  opposed  the  South. 
It  is  you,  Medill,  who  is  largely  responsible  for  making 
blood  flow  as  it  has.  Yon  called  for  war  until  you  had  it. 
I  have  given  it  to  you.  What  you  have  asked  for  you  have 
had.  Now  you  come  here  begging  to  be  let  off  from  the  call 
for  more  men,  which  I  have  made  to  carry  on  the  war  you 
demanded.  You  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourselves.  Go 
home  and  raise  your  6,000  men.  And  you,  Medill,  you 
and  your  Tribune  have  had  more  influence  than  any  other 
paper  in  the  Northwest  in  making  this  war.  Go  home  and 
send  me  those  men  I  want.'  " 

Medill  says  that  he  and  his  companions,  feeling  guilty,  left 
without  further  argument.  They  returned  to  Chicago,  and 
6,000  more  men  from  the  working  classes  were  dragged  from 
their  homes,  their  families,  forced  into  the  ranks  to  risk  limbs 
and  lives  in  a  war  they  had  no  part  in  making,  while  the  men 
that  forced  that  war  on  an  unwilling  people  remained  at  home 
in  comfort  and  safety,  and  made  enormous  fortunes  by  the  war. 


1 62  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     23 

Is  it  any  wonder  educated  workingmen  often  become  anarchists 
and  hate  all  governments  ? 

Reflect,  oh,  reader,  on  Lincoln's  words: 

"You,  Medill  called  for  war.  I  have  given  you  war. 
What  you  asked  for  you  have.  You  demanded  war.  I 
(Lincoln)  have  given  you  what  you  demanded,  and  you,  Me- 
dill, are  largely  responsible  for  all  the  blood  that  has  flowed." 

In  the  court  of  posterity  Lincoln  will  not  be  able  to  throw 
all  of  that  responsibility  on  Medill.  Had  Lincoln  been  true  to 
his  trust,  true  to  the  principles  of  '76,  true  to  the  United  States 
Constitution  he  had  sworn  to  obey,  true  to  the  party  whose  vote 
had  put  him  in  office,  true  to  the  great  body  of  the  Northern  peo- 
ple, who  opposed  war,  true  to  his  own  declaration  of  the  right  of 
secession,  no  number  of  Medills  and  no  number  of  Chandlers 
could  have  made  him  begin  that  awful  war  of  the  60s.  These 
three  men,  Lincoln,  Seward  and  Medill,  were  the  chief  conspir- 
ators against  American  liberty.  They  lived  to  see  the  triumph 
of  their  evil  work.  They  lived  to  see  the  principles  of  Democ- 
racy trampled  down  into  the  bloody  mire  on  a  hundred  battlefields. 
They  lived  to  see  the  desolation  of  the  States  they  had  hated  for 
their  adherence  to  Jefferson's  principles.  They  lived  to  see  the 
once  free  people  of  the  States  on  the  South  Atlantic  coast  rob- 
bed of  every  liberty  they  had  won  by  their  swords  from  Eng- 
land's King.  They  lived  to  see  the  South's  fair  and  fruitful 
fields  desolate  deserts,  her  homes  heaps  of  ashes,  her  fertile  land 
a  wide  waste ;  and  if,  during  all  that  devilish  work,  one  word  of 
sympathy  for  the  suffering  people  of  the  South,  one  word  of 
pity  for  the  anguish  and  agonies  endured,  ever  passed  the  lips 
of  either  of  these  three  men  I  have  failed  to  find  any  record  there- 
of. On  the  contrary,  the  more  cruel  officers  and  soldiers  in  the 
field,  the  more  highly  they  were  commended.  It  is  related  that 
the  last  utterance  that  fell  from  Lincoln's  lips  was  a  gibe  at  the 
crushed  and  conquered  South. 

"Shall  the  orchestra  play  Dixie?"  he  was  asked  as  he  sat 
in  his  box  in  Ford's  theatre  that  fatal  night.  "We  have  con- 
quered the  South,"  returned  Lincoln  gleefully,  "we  may  as 
well  take  her  music." 

Even  as  he  spoke  the  unseen  Nemesis  was  standing  near, 
her  eyes  upon  him.  In  her  hidden  hand  the  missile  of  death. 
To  the  sound  of  the  South's  spirit-stirring  air  the  soul  of  the  man 
who  had  rushed  on  carnage  fled  from  its  house  of  clay  to  stand 


Chap.  24  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  163 

before  the  bar  of  the  Great  Judge  and  receive  sentence  for  the 
deeds  he  had  done  on  earth. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

Greeley  Opposes  War  on  the  South.  He  Speaks  to  and  for  the 
Republican  Party.  He  Declares  the  Right  of  Secession. 
Why  Lincoln  did  not  Sooner  Begin  the  U^ar.  Why  Bnch- 
anan  did  not  Begin  It. 

Before  giving  Mr.  Greeley's  testimony,  it  is  well  to  show 
the  people  of  this  age  how  he  stood  with  his  own  party.  Greeley 
was  a  life-long  abolitionist.  All  abolitionists  believed  in  the 
right  of  secession.  All  hated  the  Union  and  wanted  to  break  it 
to  pieces.  No  man  stood  higher  in  the  Republican  party  than 
Greeley.  In  "Onr  Presidents,  and  How  We  Make  Thcjii,"  Mc- 
Clure  says : 

"Greeley  was  one  of  the  noblest,  purest  and  ablest  of 
the  great  men  of  the  land.  Greeley  was  in  closer  touch  with 
the  active  sense  of  the  people  than  even  President  Lincoln 
himself." 

After  Lincoln's  death,  and  the  apotheosis  ceremony  had 
been  performed,  it  became  the  custom  of  Republican  writers  and 
speakers  to  talk  of  "Lincoln's  being  in  touch  with  the  people." 
This  is  nothing  but  apotheosis  twaddle.  Lincoln  was  no  more 
in  touch  with  the  common  people  than  he  was  with  the  distin- 
guished leaders  of  his  own  party.  It  is  almost  the  unanimous 
testimony  of  Republicans  who  knew  the  living  Lincoln  that  he 
was  neither  trusted  or  beloved  by  the  people  of  any  class.  Stan- 
ton, when  on  his  death-bed,  told  General  Piatt  that  the  common 
soldiers  in  the  army  had  to  be  warned  by  their  officers  not  to 
manifest  their  dislike  to  Lincoln  when  he  came  to  review  them. 

McClure  says: 

"Greeley's  Tribune  was  the  most  widely  read  Republican 
paper  in  the  country,  and  was  more  potent  in  moulding  Re- 
publican sentiment." 

In  a  letter  to  Robert  J.  Walker,  Lincoln  said: 

"Greeley  is  a  great  power :  to  have  him  firmly  behind  me 
would  be  equal  to  an  army  of  100,000  men." 

At  no  time  did  Lincoln  have  Greeley  behind  him.     It  is  said  - 
Greeley  was  always  a  thorn  in  Lincoln's  side.     He  was  a  very 


164  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     24 

large  thorn  in  opposing  the  war,  and  after  the  war  was  on  Gree- 
ley was  a  severe  critic  of  Lincoln's  methods  of  management.  Any 
Democrat  as  outspoken  as  Greeley  would  promptly  have  been 
sent  to  prison.  Before  it  was  certain  that  Lincoln  meant  coer- 
cion, day  in  and  day  out  Greeley  opposed  coercion.  In  one  issue 
of  his  Tribune,  Greeley  said : 

"If  the  cotton  States  decide  that  they  can  do  better  out  of 
the  Union  than  in  it,  we  insist  on  letting  them  go  in  peace." 
In  another  issue  Greeley  said: 

"If  eight  States,  having  5,000,000  people,  choose  to 
separate  from  us,  they  cannot  be  permanently  prevented  by 
cannon." 

Greeley  did  not  then  dream  it  was  the  purpose  of  Lincoln 
an('  Seward  to  change  the  form  of  the  Union  Government  from 
the  principles  of  '76  to  the  monarchic  strong  Central  Government 
advocated  by  Hamilton,  which  would  enable  them  forcibly  to 
hold  the  South  in  the  Union. 

On  December  17,  i860,  the  Tribune  had  this: 

"The  South  has  as  good  a  right  to  secede  from  the 
LTnion  as  the  colonies  had  to  secede  from  Great  Britain. 
I  will  never  stand  for  coercion,  for  subjugation.  It  would 
not  be  just." 

This  was  good  Democratic  doctrine,  but  not  yet  was  Lin- 
coln ready  to  arrest  and  imprison  men  for  such  utterances. 

In  the  New  York  Tribune,  December  17,  i860,  three  days  be- 
fore South  Carolina  seceded  from  the  Union,  Greeley  had  this : 

"If  the  Declaration  of  Independence  justified  the  seces- 
sion from  the  British  Empire  of  3,000,000  of  colonists  in 
1776,  we  do  not  see  why  it  would  not  justify  the  secession 
of  5,000,000  of  Southerners  from  the  Federal  Union  in 
i860." 

Democracy  of  this  sort  was  hard  to  bear,  but  still  Lincoln 
and  Seward  were  silent. 

In  the  Tribune  of  February  23.  1861,  five  days  after  Jeffer- 
son Davis  was  inaugurated  President  of  the  Southern  Confed- 
eracy, Greeley's  Tribune  had  this : 

"If  the  cotton  States  or  the  gulf  States  choose  to 
form  an  independent  nation,  they  have  a  clear  moral  right 
to  do  so.  If  the  great  body  of  the  Southern  people  have 
become  alienated  from  the  Union  and  wish  to  escape  from 
it,  we  will  do  our  best  to  forward  their  views." 


Chap.  24  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  165 

When  Greeley  wrote  these  articles,  in  his  heart  was  a  strong 
sense  of  Democratic  justice.  Greeley  knew  that  for  over  twen- 
ty years  his  own  party  had  done  and  said  everything  the  bit- 
terness of  hate  conld  devise  to  alienate  the  Southern  States  and 
drive  them  out  of  the  Union.  He  knew  that  his  party,  day  in 
and  day  out,  for  years  had  been  hurling  on  Southern  men  and 
women  every  species  of  calumny  and  insult  the  English  lan- 
guage could  convey.  He  knew  his  party  was  extremely  anxious 
to  have  the  South  secede.  He  knew  that  the  foremost  men  of 
his  party  had  publicly  invited  the  men  of  the  South  to  join  them 
in  measures  to  break  up  the  Union.  Democratic  doctrines  of  this 
nature  daily  appearing  in  the  Republican  party's  most  influen- 
tial paper  greatly  annoyed  and  alarmed  Lincoln  and  Seward,  but 
not  yet  had  the  time  arrived  to  apply  the  thumb  screws  of  force. 
The  Tribune  continued  to  give  forth  what  war  Republicans  call- 
ed Democratic  screeches. 

On  November  5,  i860,  in  his  Tirhune,  Greeley  said: 

"Whenever  a  considerable  section  of  our  Union  is  re- 
solved to  go  out  of  the  Union,  we  shall  resist  all  coercive 
measures  to  keep  them  in.  We  hope  never  to  live  in  a  Re- 
public when  one  section  is  pifined  to  another  by  bayonets. 
Those  who  would  rush  on  carnage  to  defeat  the  separation 
demanded  by  the  popular  vote  of  the  Southern  people  would 
clearly  place  themselves  in  the  wrong." 

On  March  2,  1861,  in  the  Tribune,  Greeley  had  this: 

"We  have  repeatedly  said,  and  we  once  more  say,  the 
great  principles  embodied  in  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence, that  Governments  derive  their  just  powers  from  the 
consent  of  the  governed,  is  sound  and  just.  If  the  South- 
ern people  choose  to  secede  and  found  an  independent 
government  of  their  own,  they  have  the  moral  right  to  do 
so." 

This  was  the  last  trumpet-toned  blast  from  Greeley.  Lin- 
coln and  Seward  were  nov  ready  to  act.  "This  must  be  stop- 
ped or  it  will  stop  us,"  muttered  the  man  whose  foot  was  on  the 
step  of  the  first  American  throne.  "Give  me  a  little  bell,"  re- 
turned his  high  chief  counselor,  "and  I'll  ring  for  the  arrest  of 
every  Democratic  screecher."  What  measures  were  used  to 
silence  Greeley,  or  rather  to  make  him  sing  an  entirely  differ- 
ent tune,  may  never  be  known,  but  they  were  effective.  The 
change  was  made  in  a  single  night.     On  the  morning  follow- 


1 66  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     24 

ing  his  strongest  Democratic  utterance,   Greeley  completely  re- 
versed his  position,  and  thenceforth  the  pages  of  the   Tribune 
were  freely  besprinkled  with  words  grown  obsolete  under  Dem- 
ocracy's rule — words  native  to     kingly     climes — rebel,     traitor, 
treason,  loyal,  disloyal,  truly  loyal,  etc.     Under  cover  of  dark- 
ness Greeley  cut  loose  forever  from  the  principles  of  1776,  and 
fled  to  the  camp  of  the  men   who  represented   the   dogmas   of 
George  III.  of  England.     He  became  not  only  the  advocate  of 
those  dogmas,  but  the  ally  and  servitor  of  the  men  who  rushed 
on  carnage.     He  not  only  upheld  the  wrong  he  had  so  eloquentlv 
denounced,  but  viciously  turned  on  the  victims  of  that  wrong, 
traduced  and  maligned  them  to  excuse  his  own  ignoble  and  cow- 
ardly abandonment  of  sacred  principles.     After  the  war  ended 
Greeley  wrote  a  book  called  the  "American  Conflict,"  and  as  if  to 
justifv  his  change  from  the  principles  of  '76  to  the  doctrine  of 
imperialism,  he  affected  to  believe  that  the  South  had  fought  for 
slavery  and  the  Republican  party  to  destroy  slavery.     No  man 
in  America  better  than  Greeley  knew  that  the  South  fought  for 
precisely  the  same  principles  for  which  the  colonies  of  '76  had 
fought — independence.     No  man  better  than  Greelev  knew  that 
Lincoln  inaugurated  war  from  precisely  the  same  motives  \vhich 
made  George  HI.  of  England  wage  war  on  the  colonies — con- 
quest.    To    sustain    the    falsehood    that    the    South    fought    for 
slavery,   Greeley  plentifully  besprinkled   the  pages  of  his  book 
with   words   intended  to  convey  the  idea  that  slavery  was  the 
animus,  the  germ  of  the  war.     The     words     "rebels,     traitors, 
slave-holders'      rebellion,      slave-holders'      war,      slave-holders' 
treason,"    stare   out    from    every   page   of    Greeley's   book.     No 
man  better  than  Greeley  knew  it  was  no  more  the  slave-holders' 
war  than  was  the   war  of  '76.     Greeley  knew   that  the   great 
body  of  the  South's  people  almost  to  a  unit  wanted  independ- 
ence, and  fought  to  gain  it.     He  knew  that  the  great  body  of  the 
South's  people  were  not  slave-holders.     Blair,  of  Maryland,  a 
close  friend  of  Lincoln,  on  this  subject  said: 

"It  is  absurd  to  say  this  is  the  slave-holders'  war.  In 
til  the  South  are  only  about  250,000  slave  holders.  These 
rich  men  are  not  too  eager  for  war.  It  is  the  Southern 
people's  war.  The  people  zi'aiif  independence  and  mean  to 
get  it  if  they  can." 

The  cotton,  rice  and  sugar  planters  were  mostly  the  slave 
holders  of  the  South.  These  w^ere  not  the  men  most  eager  to 
risk  life  and  property  in  battling  for  independence.     As  a  gen- 


Chap.  24  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  167 

eral  rule,  the  rich  are  conservative,  are  afraid  of  untried  condi- 
tions. The  thousand  and  one  insults,  the  slanaers,  the  intense 
hatred  New  England,  first  led  by  Federalists,  then  by  the  Re- 
publican party,  for  sixty  years  had  hurled  on  the  South's  people, 
had  driven  them  to  secession.  Who  would  not  wish  to  leave 
a  house  of  hate  ? 

Greeley   said   that  the    Tribune  had  plenty   of  company  in 

its  anti-war  sentiments.     It  is  stated  that  over  two  hundred  of 

the  foremost  journals  in  the  East  coincided  with  Greeley  in 
opposition  to  war. 

The  New  York  Herald,  November  9,  i860,  said: 

"For  far  less  provocation  than  the  South  has  had,  our 
fathers  seceded  from  Great  Britain.  Coercion  is  out  of  the 
question  ;  each  State  possesses  the  right  to  break  the  tie  of  the 
Union,  as  a  nation  has  to  break  a  treaty.  A  State  has  the 
right  to  repel  coercion  as  a  nation  has  to  repel  invasion." 

Morse,  in  "Lincoln,  One  of  the  American  Statesmen  Ser- 
ies,^' published  in  1892,  says: 

"It  was  appalling  to  read  the  columns  of  Greeley's 
Tribune." 

It  was  appalling  only  to  the  few  men  of  that  time  who,  with 
Seward,  Lincoln,  Chandler  and  Aledill,  were  eager  to  begin  war, 
and  impatient  at  the  people's  opposition.  In  his  "Life  of  Lin- 
coln," published  in  1865,  Holland  gives  the  reason  why  Lincoln 
did  not  call  for  armed  men  to  "suppress  rebels"  before  the  fall 
of  Sumter. 

"Up  to  the  fall  of  Sumter,"  says  Holland,  "Mr.  Lin- 
coln had  no  basis  for  action  in  the  public  feeling.  If  he 
had  raised  an  army,  that  would  have  been  an  act  of  hostil- 
ity, that  would  have  been  coercion.  A  thousand  Northern 
presses  would  have  pounced  down  on  him  as  a  provoker 
of  war.     After  the  fall  of  Sumter   was  the  time  to  act." 

This  shows  how  almost  unanimous  was  the  public  feeling 
against  war  until  after  the  Northern  people  had  been  worked 
up  by  the  lie  that  the  South  intended  to  invade  the  North.  Re- 
publican writers  of  today  call  the  opposition  of  that  time  treason, 
and  the  opposers  "traitors."  If  they  were  traitors,  then  more 
than  two-thirds  of  the  American  people  in  the  North  were 
traitors. 


i68  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     23 

John  T.  Moyse,  in  "Lincoln,  American  Statesman  Series, 
1892,"  excuses  President  Buchanan  on  the  same  ground  that 
Holland  excuses  Lincoln.     He  says: 

"While  Buchanan's  message  to  Congress  (announcing 
that  he  had  no  constitutional  warrant  to  coerce  seceding 
States)  had  been  bitterly  denounced  a  palliating  considera- 
tion ought  to  be  noted,  viz:  The  fact  that  Buchanan  knew 
that  he  had  no  reason  to  believe  that  if  he  had  asserted  the 
right  and  duty  of  war,  he  would  be  supported  by  either  the 
moral  or  the  physir^l  force  ci  Ihc  people.  The  almost  uni- 
versal feeling  of  the  people  in  the  North  was  strongly  op- 
posed to  any  act  of  war.     Their  spirit  was  conciliatory," 

McClure,  author  of  "Lincoln  and  Men  of  the  War  Time," 
page  292,  says : 

"A  very  large  proportion  of  the  Republican"  party,  in- 
cluding its  most  trusted  leaders,  believed  that  peaceable  se- 
cession would  result  in  reconstruction." 


CHAPTER  XXV. 

Almost   Universal  Opposition  to   War  on  the  South.     Indiana 

Longs  for  Peace.  Governor  Morton's  Desperate  Fidelity. 
"I  am  the  State."  Congressman  Cameron's  Bosh  on  the  "Life 
of  the  Nation."     Nicolay  and  Hay's  Bosh  on  "Treason." 

Morse,  p.  250,  says: 

"Most  of  Lincoln's  ministers  were  against  the  re-en- 
forcement of  Fort  Sumter." 

They  opposed  a  re-enforcement  because  they  knew  a  re-en- 
forcement meant  war.  Mass  meetings  were  held  in  Northern 
States  denouncing  war,  and  messages  sent  to  Lincoln,  warning 
him  that  if  he  sent  an  army  South  he  would  find  a  fire  in  his  rear. 

Is  it  not  marvelous  that  men  of  today  seem  to  believe  it 
quite  a  credit  to  Lincoln  that  he  alone  begun  the  war  in  opposi- 
tion to  the  great  body  of  the  people?  Morse  and  other  Repub- 
lican writers  seem  to  believe  it  redounds  to  Lincoln's  glory,  that 
he  made  war  on  the  South  in  opposition  to  the  people's  wishes. 
They  seem  to  forget  that  the  basic  principle  of  this  Government 
is  that  the  will  of  the  people  shall  rule,  not  the  will  of  one  man. 

In  "American  Conflict,"  Greeley,  p.  356,  says: 

"The   Southern  States  had  the  active  sympathy  of  a 
large  majority  of  the  American  people." 


Chap.  25  Facts  and  Falskhoous.  169 

It  is  now  the  Republican's  custom  to  say  that  this  sympathy 
was  caused  by  "demoraHzation."  By  what  right  did  the  small 
minority  force  war  on  the  large  majority?     Morse  says: 

"Greeley,  Wendell  Philips,  Seward  and  Chase,  repre- 
sentative men  of  the  Republican  party,  were  little  better 
than  secessionists." 

Is  it  possible  that  Mr.  Morse  is  so  ignorant  of  the  history 
of  the  Republican  party  as  not  to  know  that  from  its  organization, 
in  1854,  up  to  the  first  blow  of  war  struck  by  Lincoln  at  Sumter, 
the  whole  Republican  party  were  secessionists,  and  that  party 
had  labored  for  disunion,  labored  for  secession?  Is  it  possible 
that  Mr.  Morse  knows  nothing  of  the  efforts  the  Federal  fore- 
fathers of  Republicans  made  in  1804  and  1814  to  get  New  Eng- 
land to  secede  from  the  Union  and  to  form  a  Northeastern  Con- 
federacy ?  Is  it  possible  he  is  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  such  men 
as  Senator  Wade  of  Ohio,  Abraham  Lincoln,  and  other  high 
lights  in  the  Republican  party  long  before  the  South  seceded, 
made  speeches  declaring  the  right  of  the  South  to  secede?  The 
right  to  form  an  independent  government?  What  right  has 
Morse,  or  any  man,  to  attempt  to  write  history  when  he  is 
ignorant  of  the  most  important  facts  of  said  history? 

Boutwell,  member  of  Congress  from  Massachusetts,  says: 
"With  varying  degrees  of  intensity  the  whole  Demo- 
cratic  party   sympathized    with   the    South    and    arraigned 
Lincoln  and  the  Republican  party  for  all  the  country  en- 
dured." 

No  man  worthy  of  the  name  Democrat  can  refuse  to  sym- 
pathize with  a  brave  people  fighting  at  desperate  odds  for  their 
homes,  their  lives,  their  liberties.  Was  there  one  Democrat  in 
all  America  who  did  not  sympathize  with  the  brave  Boers  of 
South  Africa?  Only  imperialists  and  monarchists  can  fail  to 
feel  for  brave  men  fighting  for  freedom. 

Boutwell  says: 

"During  the  entire  period  of  the  war  New  York  and 
Illinois  were  doubtful  States.  Indiana  was  only  kept  in  line 
by  the   desperate  fidelity  of  Governor   Morton." 

"Desperate  fidelity"  here  means  Morton's  desperate  deter- 
mination to  make  himself  absolute  master  of  Indiana.  This  he 
did,  by  Lincoln's  aid,  and  for  two  years  Morton  was  able  to  say, 


170  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

"I  am  the  State."  In  Foulk's  Life  of  Governor  Morton,  pub- 
lished 1899,  Chapter  twenty-two  is  headed  by  the  words,  "7  am 
the  State,"  and  RepubHcans  of  today  glory  in  the  fact  that  a 
man  elected  Governor  of  a  free  State  in  the  Union  was  able  to 
rob  the  people  of  that  State  of  every  liberty  they  possessed,  and 
make  himself  their  master  for  two  years.  The  facts  were  these : 
The  people  of  Indiana  were  weary  of  the  war.  Lincoln  had 
refused  to  permit  two  commissioners  from  the  South  to  enter 
Washington  City.  The  people  believed  the  art  of  diplomacy 
might  end  the  war,  and  believed  that  Lincoln  made  no  effort  that 
way.  All  over  Indiana,  as,  indeed,  all  over  every  State  on  the  West 
and  the  South,  went  up  the  anguished  wail,  "Oh,  the  cruel  war ! 
Oh,  the  cruel  war!"  The  people  of  Indiana  elected  to  the  Legis- 
lature men  pledged  to  use  every  effort  to  promote  peace  and  stop 
bloodshed.  Morton  and  Lincoln  resolved  that  these  peace-loving 
men  should  never  act  as  legislators.  By  Lincoln's  aid  Mor- 
ton's "desperate  fidelity"  made  him  master  of  the  State  for  two 
years.  Not  a  man  elected  to  the  Legislature  was  al- 
lowed to  perform  his  duties.  Nicolay  and  Hay,  as  all  other 
modern  Republican  writers,  justify  Morton's  usurpation  of  State 
power  on  the  ground  that  "disloyalty  was  widespread  through- 
out the  West."  Disloyalty  means  anything  opposed  to  Lincoln's 
policy  of  conquering  the  South  by  bloody  battles.  Disloyalty 
is  always  the  ready  excuse  for  despotism. 
Holland,  in  his  Life  of  Lincoln,  says: 

"In  proportion  as  people  were  treasonable  they  op- 
posed the  suspension  of  the  habeas  corpus  and  denounced 
arbitrary  arrests." 

To  condemn  despotism   is  always  treasonable  in  the  opin- 
ion of  despots  and  despot  worshippers. 

In  the  Life  of  Vice-President  Hannibal  Hamlin,  p.  459,  is 
this: 

"If  we  (the  Republican  war  party)  had  had  a  common 
union  in  the  North,  and  a  common  loyalty  to  the  Lincoln 
Government,  we  could  have  ended  the  war  months  ago." 

This  means  that  the  people  of  the  North  so  hated  the  war 
it  impeded  the  wicked  work  of  conquest. 

In  Andrews'  History  of  the  United  States,  p.  95,  the  author 
says : 

"An  absurd  prejudice  against  coercion  largely  possess- 
ed the  loyal  masses  throughout  the  whole  North :  the  feeling 
was  strong  against  all  efforts  at  coercion." 


Chap.  25  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  171 

It  is  gratifying  to  humane  hearts,  even  at  this  late  day,  thirty- 
eight  years  after  the  end  of  that  woeful  war,  to  know  that  the 
great  masses  of  the  North's  people  had  such  kindly  feelings 
toward  the  South 's  people  as  to  oppose  the  bloody  war  of  con- 
quest which  Lincoln  and  Seward  waged  upon  them.  This 
knowledge  will  do  much  toward  restoring  friendly  feelings  in 
the  South.  On  February  20,  1901.  in  the  House  of  Represent- 
atives, referring  to  the  opposition  of  the  60s  to  Mr.  Lincoln's 
war,    Mr.    Cameron,    of    Illinois,    said: 

"When  the  life  of  the  Nation  was  at  stake,  men  all 
over  the  North  stood  behind  the  firing  line  and  encouraged 
desertion  from  the  army.  I  thought  if  8,000  or  10,000  Cop- 
perheads had  been  shot  the  result  would  have  been  less  de- 
sertion." 

The  reader  must  bear  in  mind  that  Copperhead  was  the  pet 
narae  Republicans  in  the  60s  gave  to  Northern  Democrats,  and 
further  bear  in  mind  that  any  man  who  dared  to  doubt  the  jus- 
tice of  Lincoln's  war  on  the  South  was  a  Copperhead,  a  seces- 
sionist, a  traitor,  all  in  one.  I,  for  one.  thank  Mr.  Cameron  for 
his  little  item  of  information  ;  I  rejoice  that  numbers  of  men,  large 
or  small,  under  the  dark  despotism  of  Lincoln's  rule,  had  the 
courage  to  stand  behind  the  firing  line  and  advise  soldiers  to  es- 
cape from  the  danger,  the  wickedness,  of  fighting  a  war  of  con- 
quest on  a  free  people.  When  Mr.  Cameron  talks  of  the  "life 
of  the  Nation  at  stake,"  he  talks  without  judgment  and  with- 
out truth.  Never  for  a  moment  was  the  life  of  the  Nation  or 
of  the  North's  L'^nion  Government  at  stake.  The  South  never 
threatened  the  life  of  the  Nation  or  of  the  North's  Union  Gov- 
ernment. 

In  Rope's  Story  of  the  Civil  War  (war  of  conquest)  he 
says: 

"During  the  winter  of  i860  Congress  took  no  action 
whatever  looking  toward  the  preparation  for  the  conquest 
of  the  outgoing  States." 

That  Congress  well  knew  it  had  no  constitutional  or  moral 
right  to  conquer  the  South.  It  had  no  inclination  ;  that  Con- 
gress, as  well  as  the  people  of  that  time  all  over  the  North,  were 
in  a  peaceful  mood  and  hated  the  very  iidea  of  coercing  the 
South.  '  ^ 

Morse  says: 


172  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

"Most  of  Lincoln's  ministers  were  against  the  re-enforce- 
ment of  Fort  Sumter." 

They  knew  the  attempt  to  re-enforce  meant  war.  They  did 
not  want  war. 

January  21,  1861,  before  an  immense  gathering  in  New 
York,  an  orator  said : 

"If  a  revoh:tion  is  to  begin,  it  shall  be  inaugurated 
at  home." 

This  was  roundly  cheered.     Before  Lincoln  let  slip  the 
dogs  of  war,  the  distinguished  Chancellor  Walworth  said : 

"It  will  be  as  brutal  to  send  men  to  butcher  our  broth- 
ers in  the  South  as  it  would  be  to  massacre  them  in  the  North." 

It  certainly  was  as  brutal  and  as  unjust.  This  brutality  the 
Republican  party  committed. 

A  large  meeting  in  Faneuil  Hall,  Boston,  was  emphatic 
against  war. 

"The  symptoms,"  says  Horace  Greeley  in  American  Con- 
flict, were  that  vast  numbers  were  infected  with  such  senti- 
ments. It  was  feared  at  the  North  that  blood  would  flow  in 
Northern  cities  as  soon  and  as  freely  as  in  Southern,  if  forc- 
ible coercion  should  be  attempted.  Matters  looked  even 
worse  for  the  Union  in  Congress  than  in  the  country.  The 
prevalent  desire  was  for  peace,  while  some  adopted  seces- 
sion doctrines.  Daniel  Sickles,  in  the  House,  threatened 
that  the  secession  of  the  South  should  be  followed  by  that 
of  New  York  City." 

On  page  441,  Vol.  i,  Nicolay  and  Hay.  in  their  Life  of 
Lincoln,  give  the  following  picture  of  the  Northern  people's 
state  of  mind  at  that  time : 

"It  will  hardly  be  possible  for  readers  in  our  day  (1890) 
to  understand  the  state  of  public  sentiment  in  the  United 
States  during  the  month  of  March,  1861.  The  desire  for 
peace,  the  hope  for  compromise,  strangest  of  all,  a  national 
lethargy  utterly  impossible  to  account  for,  seemed  to  mark 
a  decadence  of  patriotic  feeling.  This  phenomenon  is  at- 
tested in  the  records  of  many  public  men,  and  shown  in  the 
words  and  example  of  military  officers,  in  their  consenting 
to  shut  their  eyes  to  the  truth  that  it  is  the  right  of  a  Gov- 
ernment to  repel  menaces  as  well  as  blows." 


Chap.  25  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  173 

Were  logic  of  this  nature  only  used  by  the  few  it  would  not 
merit  a  moment's  attention,  but  stuff  of  this  flimsy  and  false 
texture  is  used  every  day  by  Republican  writers  and  politicians. 
The  "desire  for  peace,  the  hope  for  compromise"  felt  by  the  great 
majority  of  the  North's  people,  Nicolay  and  Hay  have  the  stu- 
pidity to  say: 

"Marked  a  decadence  of  patriotic  feeling." 

Patriotism  does  not  mean  eagerness  for  wars  of  conquest. 
War  is  the  worst  calamity  that  can  befall  a  people,  except  subjec- 
tion to  despots.  The  great  body  of  the  Northern  people  knew 
there  was  no  danger  threatening  from  the  South.  The  South 
at  that  time  had  commissioners  in  Washington  pleading  for 
peace,  and  because  the  North's  people  preferred  giving  them  peace 
to  giving  them  bloody  war,  Nicolay  and  Hay  talk  of  "patriotic 
decadence."  The  future  psychologist  will  decide  that  men 
afflicted  with  the  madness  of  war,  men  like  Chandler,  Medill,  Sew- 
ard and  Lincoln,  eager  to  plunge  two  peaceful  peoples  into  cruel 
war,  were  the  decadents,  the  degenerates  of  our  race.  How  fear- 
fully distorted  must  be  that  man's  judgment  who  calls  the  lovers 
of  peace  "decadents."  How  crooked  must  be  that  man's  channels  ' 
of  thought,  who  thinks  it  patriotism  to  uphold  the  government 
of  bloody-minded  despots.  Patriotism!  These  men  did  not 
know  the  meaning  of  the  word. 

When  Nicolay  and  Hay  talk  of  the  "right  of  a  government 
to  repel  menaces  as  well  as  blows,"  do  they  mean  to  assert  that 
the  South  menaced  the  Government,  or  the  people  of  the  North  ? 
There  is  not  the  shadow  of  foundation  for  such  an  assertion. 
In  the  most  respectful  manner,  with  the  dignity  of  free  born  men, 
the  South's  commissioners  prayed  the  Union  Government  for 
amicable  adjustment  of  their  partnership  affairs,  and  expressed 
the  desire  to  live  in  peace  and  friendship  with  their  Northern 
neighbors,  and  offered  to  pay  the  South's  just  proportion  of  the 
national  debt.  With  their  usual  trickery  and  falsehood,  Repub- 
licans made  every  eft'ort  to  inflame  the  minds  of  Northern 
people  by  representing  that  one  consequence  of  the  separation  of 
the  States  would  be  to  lose  the  free  navigation  of  the  Mississippi 
River.  The  fact  is,  as  early  as  the  25th  of  February,  1861,  an 
act  was  passed  by  the  Confederate  Congress  and  approved  by 
President  Davis  to  declare  and  establish  the  free  navigation  of 
the  Mississippi  River.  If  any  man  thinks  these  approaches  a 
menace  deserving  to  be  repelled  by  bloody  war,  his  judgment  is 
distorted  beyond  the  hope  of  remedy. 


174  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

"Treason,"  continues  Nicolay  and  Hay,  "was  every- 
where." 

The  reader  must  bear  in  mind  the  fact  that  Repubhcan 
writers  never  hesitate  to  misuse  words.  To  justify  their  own 
misdeeds,  they  call  everything  opposing  those  deeds  treason. 
Opposition  to  their  war  policy  was  treason.  As  the  principles 
of  '76  opposed  their  war  of  conquest,  faithfulness  to  those  prin- 
ciples was  treason.  The  large  majority  of  the  people  in  the 
Northern  States  opposed  the  policy  of  war.  According  to  mod- 
ern Republican  writers,  these  people  were  traitors.  The  ma- 
jority of  members  in  Lincoln's  Cabinet  at  first  opposed  war. 
Nicolay  and  Hay  excuse  this  on  the  ground  that  at  that  time 
the  Cabinet  members  did  not  recognize  Lincoln's  greatness.  Not 
until  after  Lincoln's  death  did  those  Cabinet  members,  or  any 
other  distinguished  Republican,   "see  Lincoln's  greatness. 

"The  men  in  Lincolns'  Cabinet,"  says  Nicolay  and  Hay, 
"at  that  time  looked  on  him  as  a  simple  frontier  lawyer,  to 
whom  chance  had  given  the  Presidency." 

It  is  true  that  chance  had  given  Lincoln  the  Presidency.  It 
is  true  that  he  was  neither  the  choice  of  the  American  people  at 
large  nor  of  the  majority  of  his  own  party.  The  great  major- 
ity of  his  own  party  preferred  Chase  or  Seward.  Accident  gave 
the  office  to  Lincoln.  But  if  any  man  in  his  Cabinet  looked  on 
him  as  a  simple  backwoods  lawyer,  he  could  have  made  no  great- 
er mistake.  Lincoln  was  the  least  simple  man  of  the  age.  Sim- 
ple means  plain,  open,  not  given  to  trickery  or  duplicity,  unde- 
signing,  sincere,  not  complex.  In  his  suppressed  Life  of  Lin- 
coln, Herndon  says,  "Lincoln  made  candor  and  simplicity  a 
mask."  Lamon  says  Lincoln  was  the  shrewdest  politician  of 
the  age.  Lamon,  who  knew  and  loved  Lincoln  like  a  brother, 
says  of  him : 

"Mr.  Lincoln  was  never  agitated  by  any  passion  more 
intense  than  his  wonderful  thirst  for  distinction.  This  pas- 
sion governed  all  his  conduct  up  to  the  hour  the  assassin 
struck  him  down.  He  was  ever  ready  to  be  honored ;  he 
struggled  incessantly  for  place.  Whatsoever  he  did  in  pol- 
itics, at  the  bar,  in  private  life,  had  more  or  less  reference 
to  the  great  object  of  his  life." 

Nature  had  bestowed  on  Mr.  Lincoln  two  gifts  which  he 
used  to  gain  power  and  place.  The  one,  as  Seward  described  it, 
"a  cunning  that  was  genius."     The  other  was  the  gift  of  elo- 


Chap.  25  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


175 


quence  of  a  peculiar  order,  inasmuch  as  its  power  and  beauty 
seemed  to  be  little  appreciated  by  hearers,  but  readers  were 
struck  with  admiration.  Probably  this  was  owing-  to  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's shrill,  piping  voice,  ungainly  person  and  extremely  awk- 
ward movements.  Instance  the  Gettysburg  address,  now  thought 
to  be  the  finest  specimen  .of  American  oratory.  Lamon,  who 
heard  it,  describes  its  effect  on  Lincoln's  audience  as  follows: 

"Mr.  Lincoln,"  says  Lamon  in  his  "Recollections  of 
Lincoln,"  said  to  me,  'I  tell  you,  Lamon,  that  speech  was 
like  a  wet  blanket  on  the  audience.  I  am  distressed  about 
it.'  " 

On  the  platform,  the  moment  after  Mr.  Lincoln's  speech 
was  concluded,  Mr.  Seward  asked  Mr.  Everett,  the  orator  of  the 
day,  what  he  thought  of  the  President's  speech.  Mr.  Everett 
rephed:  "It  is  not  what  I  expected.  I  am  disappointed.  What 
do  you  think  of  it,  Mr.  Seward?"  The  response  was,  "He 
has  made  a  failure."  In  the  face  of  these  facts  it  has  been  re- 
peatedly published  that  this  speech  was  received  by  the  audience 
with  loud  demonstrations  of  approval,  that — 

"Amid  the  tears,  sobs  and  cheers  it  produced  in  the  excit- 
ed throng,  the  orator  of  the  day  (Mr.  Everett)  turned  to 
Mr.  Lincoln,  grasped  his  hand  and  exclaimed,  "I  congratu- 
late you  on  your  success,"  adding  in  a  transport  of  heated 
enthusiasm,  "^Ir.  Presiclent,  how  gladly  would  I  give  my 
hundred  pages  to  be  the  author  of  your  twenty  lines!"  Noth- 
ing of  the  kind  ever  occurred.  The  silence  during  the  de- 
livery of  the  speech,  the  lack  of  hearty  demonstrations  of 
approval  after  its  close,  were  taken  by  Mr.  Lincoln  as  cer- 
tain proof  that  it  was  not  well  received.  In  that  opinion  we 
all  shared.  I  state  it  as  a  fact  and  without  fear  of  contra- 
diction, that  this  famous  Gettysburg  speech  was  not  regard- 
ed by  the  audience  to  whom  it  was  addressed,  or  by  the  press 
and  people  of  the  United  States,  as  a  production  of  extraor- 
dinary merit,  nor  was  it  commented  on  as  such  until  after  the 
death  of  Mr.  Lincoln." 

— Lamon's  Recollections  of  Lincoln,  p.   173. 

It  is  now  said  that  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln  is  fast  disap- 
pearing from  the  face  of  the  earth  ;  that  the  same  agency  which 
swept  out  of  existence  Herndon's  Life  of  Lincoln  is  fast  pur- 
suing the  same  course  with  Lamon's  book.  Is  this  because  Re- 
publicans do  not  want  their  apotheosizing  romances  about  Mr. 


176  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

Lincoln  exposed  and  corrected,  as  Lamon  exposed  and  corrected 
the  twaddle  about  the  Gettysburg  speech? 

Before  the  South  seceded,  the  foremost  men  in  the  Re- 
publican party  openly  maintained  the  right  of  secession.  Wm. 
Lloyd  Garrison,  Wendell  Phillips,  Sumner,  Wade  of  Ohio,  Henr> 
Ward  Beecher,  Chase,  Lincoln  and  hosts  of  others  were  among 
the  number.  In  fact,  the  whole  Republican  party  taught  that 
the  principle  of  secession  was  right  and  labored  for  disunion. 
Some  of  these  men  after  Carolina  and  other  States  had  seceded, 
continued  to  assert  the  right  of  secession.  Phillips,  in  a  speech 
joyously  announcing  secession,  said : 

"Twenty  years  ago  the  men  of  the  North  resolved  to 
dissolve  the  Union.  Who  dreamed  success  would  come  so 
soon?" 

In  a  speech  in  Faneuil  Hall,  Boston,  February  2,  1861,  Ed- 
ward Everett  said: 

"To  expect  to  hold  fifteen  States  in  the  Union  by  force 
is  preposterous.  If  our  sister  States  must  leave  us,  in  the 
name  of  Heaven  let  them  go  in  peace." 

The  New  York  Herald,  independent  in  politics,  November 
II,  i860,  said: 

"The  South  has  an  undeniable  right  to  secede  from  the 
Union.  In  the  event  of  secession,  the  City  of  New  York. 
the  State  of  New  Jersey,  and  ve'ry  likely  Connecticut,  will 
separate  from  New  England,  where  the  black  man  is  put  on 
a  pinnacle  above  the  white.  New  York  City  is  for  the  Union 
first,  and  for  the  gallant  and  chivalrous  South  afterwards." 

Holland,  in  his  Life  of  Lincoln,  says: 

"For  months  after  South  Carolina  had  seceded,  while 
State  after  State  was  passing  secession  ordinances  and  were 
seizing  forts  and  arsenals  in  their  boundaries,  neither  Pres- 
ident or  Cabinet  or  Supreme  Court  at  Washington  took  one 
step  toward  coercion." 

Why  should  these  high  powers  take  a  step  toward  coercion? 
The  highest  legal  authority  in  the  land  had  advised 
President  Buchanan  that  neither  he  nor  Congress  had  any  right 
to  coerce  seceding  States.  Not  only  this,  the  great  majority  of 
the  North's  people  had  accepted  that  advice  as  right  and  just. 
and  opposed  coercion.  In  his  "American  Conflict,"  Greeley 
says: 


Chap.  25  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  177 

"The  active  and  earnest  sympathy  of  a  large  majority 
of  the  American  people  was  with  the  South." 

The  Legislatures  of  Illinois  and  New  Jersey  were  nearly 
unanimous  in  that  direction. 
On  page  513,  Greeley  says: 

"There  was  not  a  moment  when  a  large  portion  of  the 
Northern  Democracy  were  not  hostile  to  any  form  or  shade 
of  coercion.  Many  openly  condemned  and  stigmatized  a  war 
on  the  South  as  atrocious,  unjustifiable  and  aggressive." 

No  Democrat  that  ever  lived  could  think  a  war  of  conquest 
on  free  States  right.  This  belief  is  left  for  men  of  the  imperial- 
istic Republican  party. 

On  page  270,  Morse  says: 

"By  the  end  of  May,  1861,  Mr.  Lincoln  looked  forth  on  a 
spectacle  as  depressing  as  ever  greeted  the  eye  of  a  great 
ruler.  Eleven  States,  with  an  area  and  a  population  and 
resources  for  constituting  a  powerful  nation,  their  peo- 
ple in  entire  unity  of  feeling,  and  two-thirds  of  the  North's 
people  in  sympathy  with  their  secession." 

Reader,  mark  the  two  last  lines  of  the  above.  The  South- 
ern people  in  entire  unity  of  feeling  {in  zmnting  independence) 
and  two-thrds  of  the  North's  people  in  sympathy  zvith  seces- 
sion. Yet,  ten  thousand  times  have  Republicans  tried  to  blacken 
the  South's  cause  by  the  infamous  lie  that  they  were  fighting 
the  slave-holder's  war  to  maintain  slavery.  The  reader  should 
also  notice  the  title,  "great  ruler,"  which  Mr.  Morse  gives  to 
Lincoln.  When  the  principles  of  Democracy  pervaded  this 
country,  men  elected  to  office  were  called  the  servants  of  the 
people,  not  the  rulers.  Never  yet  have  the  people  of  America 
elected  any  man  to  rule  them,  but  to  serve.  Lincoln  was  the  first 
President  who  usurped  the  power  to  rule  the  American  people. 
McClure,  page  56,  says :  , 

"When  Lincoln  turned  to  the  military  arm  of  the  Gov- 
ernment he  was  appalled  by  the  treachery  of  the  men  whom 
the  Nation  should  look  to  for  protection.  Nearly  one- 
third  of  the  oflficers  in  the  regular  army  resigned." 

It  is  appalling  in  this  age  to  see  the  judgments  of  men  like 
McClure  so  distorted  as  to  call  opposition  to  war  and  love  of 
peace  treachery.  Treachery  to  what  ?  To  whom  ?  Certainly 
not  to  the  principles  of  freedom.     Certainly  not  to  the  United 


1-8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

States  Constitution.  These  demanded  that  the  South  should 
be  free ;  not  conquered,  not  subjugated.  Certainly  not  to  the 
North's  people ;  these  McClure,  as  other  historians  state,  were 
of  the  same  opinion  as  the  military  men  who  resigned  from  the 
regular  army  rather  than  fight  a  war  of  conquest  on  a  free  peo- 
ple. McClure  makes  the  serious  mistake  of  calling  the  small 
number  of  men  determined  on  war  "the  Xation."  He  and  oth- 
ers tell  us  that  the  great  majority  of  the  Northern  people  opposed 
war.  This  majority  is  entitled  to  be  called  "the  Nation."  The 
small  minority  which  held  in  its  grip  the  machinery  of  Gov- 
ernment had  no  more  right  to  call  itself  ''the  \'ation"  than  the 
Bourbon  King  had  the  moral  right  to  say  'T  am  the  State." 

General  Keifer  says,  about  March,  1861 : 

"Disloyalty  among  the  prominent  officers  was  for  a 
time  the  rule." 

Disloyalty  here  means  loyalty  to  the  principles  of  '76.  Hap- 
good  says  of  the  officers  who  resigned  from  the  army  rather  than 
fight  a  war  of  conquest  on  the  free  people  at  the  South : 

"These  men  who  had  been  favored  with  offices  proved 
false  to  the  hand  that  pampered  them." 

Had  these  officers  received  commissions  as  favors  or  because 
they  were  expected  to  render  good  service  to  the  country  there- 
for? The  word  pamper  means  fed  to  the  full.  Does  Hapgood 
mean  to  say  that  the  President,  who  commissioned  officers  for 
the  regular  army,  bestowed  those  commissions  as  favors  and  then 
pampered  {fed  to  the  full)  those  favored  officers?  Only  a  moral 
or  mental  pervert  will  condemn  an  officer  for  resigning  rather 
than  fight  his  own  people.  These  Southern  officers  were  edu- 
cated at  West  Point,  as  much  at  the  expense  of  the  South  as  of 
the  North,  and  were  under  far  more  obligation  to  the  South  than 
to  the  North. 

Woodrow  Wilson,  in  "Disunion  and  Reunion,"  has  this: 

"President  Buchanan  agreed  with  his  Attorney-Gen- 
eral that  there  was  no  constitutional  measure  or  warrant 
for  coercing  a  State ;  such  for  the  time  seemed  to  he  the  gen- 
eral opinion  of  the  country." 

Seemed f  Did  not  Professor  Woodrow  Wilson  knozc  it  was 
no  seem,  but  long  had  been  the  actual  opinion  of  the  country? 
Yet  Republican  writers  of  today  have  the  hardihood  to  charge 


Chap.  25  Facts  axd  Falsehoods. 


179 


a  whole  country  with  "disloyalty,"  with  "appalling  treachery." 
Morse  says : 

"None  of  the  disting-uished  men  of  his  own  party  whom 
Lincoln  found  about  him  in  Washington  were  in  a  frame  of 
mind    to    assist    him    efficiently/' 

The  most  distinguished  men  of  his  own  party  were  unwill- 
ing to  assist  Mr.  Lincoln  in  his  wicked  policy  of  waging  on 
the  South  a  war  of  conquest.  These  men  well  knew  their  party 
from  its  birth  had  labored  for  disunion,  had  advocated  seces- 
sion, had  held  conventions  and  sent  invitations  to  men  of  the 
South,  urging  them  to  help  them  break  the  Union  asunder. 

Everyone  knows  the  character  of  Charles  Sumner,  Senator 
from  Massachusetts,  one  of  the  most  honored  and  trusted  mem- 
bers of  the  Republican  party.     No  man,  not  even  Greeley,  more 
strongly  opposed  war  on  the  South  than  Senator  Sumfier. 
Sumner  said : 

"Nothin-j  can  possibly  be  so  horrible,  so  wicked  or  so 
foolish  as  a  war  on  the  South." 

Xorth  American  Review,  October.  1879,  P-  378- 

Yet    Lincoln,  aided  by  Seward,  contrary  to  the  wishes  and 
will  of  the  great  majority  of  Northern  people,  did  this  horrible, 
wicked  and  foolish  thing. 
McClure  says : 

"Even  in  Philadelphia,  nearly  the  whole  of  the  com- 
mercial and  financial  interests  were  at  first  arrayed  against 
Lincoln." 

In  American  Conflict  Greeley  describes  (page  387)  a  tre- 
mendous demonstration  against  the  war  made  in  New  York, 
February,  1861.  Greeley  records  expressions  of  the  purpos* 
not  only  not  to  coerce  the  South,  but  to  aid  her  in  case  of  wat. 
Such  expressions  were  received  with  warm  applause.  In  a  speech 
of  James  S.  Thayer  it  was  alleged  that  these  views  had  been 
asserted  by  333,000  voters  in  New  York  in  the  last  election. 

— C.  L.  Minor's  Real  Lincoln. 

As  evidence  of  the  widespread  opposition  to  Lincoln's  w£i 
Greeley  relates  the  following: 

"On  the  eve  of  the  battle  of  Bull  Run  the  Fourth  Penn- 
sylvania Regiment  of  Volunteers  and  the  battery  of  artillery 
of  the  Eighth  New  York  militia,  whose  term  of  enlistment 
had  expired,  insisted  on  their  discharge,  though  the  Gen- 


i8o  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     25 

eral  and  Secretary  of  War,  both  on  the  spot,  tried  hard  to 
make  them  stay  five  days  more.  The  next  morning  when 
the  Union  army  moved  into  battle  these  troops  moved  to  the 
rear  to  the  sound  of  the  enemy's  guns." 

Greeley  concludes  the  story    thus : 

"It  should  be  added  that  a  member  of  the  New  York 
battery  aforesaid,  who  was  most  earnest  and  active  in  oppos- 
ing General  McDowell's  request  to  remain  five  days  longer, 
and  insisting  on  an  immediate  discharge,  was,  in  full  view 
of  all  these  facts,  at  the  next  election  chosen  sheriff  of  New  ' 
York,  the  most  hicrative  office  -filled  by  popular  election  in 
the  country." 

No  man  more  strongly  opposed  war  than  Greeley  himself, 
but  the  despotism  of  the  Lincoln  Government  forced  Greeley  to 
acquiesce  in  that  war. 

Ex-Governor  Reynolds,  of  Illinois,  in  a  speech  made  De- 
cember 28,  i860,  said: 

"I  am  heart  and  soul  for  the  South.  She  is  right  in 
principle,  and  from  the  Constitution." 

This  was  warmly  applauded.  Such  was  then  the  opinion  of 
the  great  body  of  the  people  in  the  Northern  States.  Three  days 
after  South  Carolina  seceded,  Governor  Reynolds  said : 

"The  Government  itself,  the  army  and  the  navy,  ought 
to  remain  with  the  South." 

On  December  9.  i860,  the  New  York  Herald,  in  a  dispatch 
from  Washington,  had  this : 

"The  current  of  opinion  seems  to  set  strongly  in  favor 
of  reconstruction,  and  leaving  out  the  New  England  States. 
These  latter  are  thought  to  be  so  fanatical  it  would  be  im- 
possible there  would  be  any  peace  under  a  Government  to 
which  they  were  parties." 

All  this  Republicans  of  this  day  call  "treason."  No  Repub- 
lican of  that  day  ventured  to  call  the  opinions  of  the  great  body 
of  the  North's  people  treason. 

In  American   Conflict,  page  436,  Greeley  says: 

"Throughout  the  Northern  States  eminent  and  eager 
advocates  of  adhesion  to  the  new  Confederacy  were  well 
and  widely  heeded.  It  was  understood  that  Governor  Sey- 
mour, of  New  York,  Judge  Woodward,  F.  W.  Hughes,  of 


Chap.  26  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  181 

Pennsylvania,  Price  of  New  Jersey,  all  distinguished  men, 
were  among  those  who  favored  adherence  to  the  South." 

Not  until  after  Lincoln  and  Seward  held  in  their  grip  all 
the  machinery  of  Government,  and  felt  certain  they  could  carry 
out  their  purpose  of  conquering  the  South,  did  the  Republican 
party  begin  to  use  the  words : 

Rebel !     Rebellion !     Traitor !     Treason ! 

The  great  numbers  of  the  North's  people  who  opposed  the 
war  suddenly  became  traitors ;  any  and  every  word  of  opposition 
became  treason ;  arbitrary  arrests  and  imprisonments  began,  and 
a  pall  of  blackest  despotism  spread  over  the  land.  Greeley's 
Tribune^  April  15,  1861,  had  this: 

"The  day  before  Sumter  was  surrendered  two-thirds  of 
the  newspapers  in  the  North  opposed  coercion  in  any  shape 
or  form,  and  sympathized  with  the  South.  These  papers 
were  the  South's  allies  and  champions.  Three-fifths  of  the 
entire  American  people  sympathized  with  the  South.  Over 
200,000  voters  opposed  coercion,  and  believed  the  South  had 
the  right  to  secede." 

Think  of  this,  men  of  America!  Think  how  easy  it  is  for 
an  American  President  elected  to  serve  and  carry  out  the  will  of 
the  people ;  how  easy  it  is  to  make  himself  the  master  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  force  them  to  do  his  will,  contrary  to  their  own. 

CHAPTER  XXVI. 

Why  Grant  Refused  to  Exchange  Prisoners.  Grant  Compares 
Northern  and  Southern  Soldiers.  Desertions  from  Union  Ar)n\. 
Riots,  Arbitrary  Arrests,  "Suspects."  Thirty-eight  Thousand 
Innocent  Men  and  Women  Fill  Northern  Prisons.  Civil  Law 
Overthrown.  Lincoln  Unpopular.  The  People's  Indigna- 
tion in  1861,  1862,  1863.  The  People's  Indictment  in  1864. 
ludiciary  Oppose  Lincoln. 

The  Journal  of  Commerce  fought  coercion  until  the  United 
States  mail  refused  to  carry  the  papers,  in  1861.  The  New  York 
Daily  Nezvs  continued  to  denounce  the  Republican  party  as  a 
blood-thirsty  set,  advocating  wholesale  murder,  as  vultures  gloat- 
ing over  carnage,  until  the  freedom  of  the  press  was  suppressed. 

John  A.  Logan,  in  Great  Conspiracy,  page  551,  describes  a 
gathering  at   Springfield,   Illinois,   Lincoln's  home,   in  June  of 


1^2  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     26 

1863.  o^  nearly  100,000  anti-war  Democrats,  wiiich  utterly  re- 
pudiated the  war.  There  was  open  and  avowed  hostility  to  Lin- 
coln in  Philadelphia,  New  York,  and  Boston,  and  of  strong  op- 
position in  New  Jersey.  So  violent  was  the  hostility  to  war  in 
Massachusetts  and  New  York,  the  call  for  volunteers  was  un- 
heeded, and  when  the  Government  demanded  a  draft,  the  people 
gathered  in  crowds  and  fearful  riots  ensued.  In  New  York  City 
the  opposition  was  so  violent,  the  rioters  so  numerous,  the  city 
was  terrified  for  days  and  nights.  The  houses  in  which  the  draft 
machines  were  at  work  were  wrecked  and  then  burned  to 
ashes.  The  police  were  powerless  to  restrain  the  immense  gath- 
erings of  men  and  women  who  walked  the  streets  day  and  night. 
The  order  for  the  draft  was  rescinded  by  the  Washington  Gov- 
ernment, the  people  urged  to  disperse  and  retire  to  their  homes, 
which  they  did,  as  they  thought,  on  the  promise  that  there  would 
be  no  more  drafting.  But  that  treacherous  Government,  as  soon 
as  the  people  returned  to  their  daily  work,  sent  a  large  body 
of  soldiers  to  overawe  them,  and  again  the  accursed  machines 
were  set  to  work,  and  again  the  wheels  began  to  turn,  until  the 
required  number  of  men  were  secured.  In  this  way  men  were 
forced  to  fight  a  people  toward  whom  they  had  no  animosity,  and 
for  a  Government  they  knew  was  blackly  despotic. 

Before  a  Congressional  committee  Grant  testified  as  follows : 

"I  refused  to  exchange  prisoners  because  as  soon  as  the 
South 's  soldiers  are  released  from  our  prisons  they  rush 
back  into  the  rebel  ranks  and  begin  fighting  again.  When 
Northern  soldiers  return  from  Southern  prisons  either  they 
never  again  enter  the  ranks,  or  if  they  do,  not  until  they  go 
to  their  homes  and  have  a  long  furlough." 

It  is  easy  enough  to  see  the  cause  of  this  difference  between 
soldiers  of  the  North  and  soldiers  of  the  South.  The  former 
were  forced  into  a  war  they  were  unwilling  to  fight,  and  millions 
believed  unjust.  The  South's  soldiers,  every  man,  felt  and  knew 
they  were  fighting  for  their  lives,  their  liberties,  their  homes,  all 
that  hearts  hold  dear.  The  very  souls  of  the  South's  men  and 
women  were  in  that  fight. 

Nicolay  and  Hay,  Vol.  VI.,  tell  of  violent  resistance  to  the 
draft  in  Pennsylvania.  Half  fed,  badly  clothed,  exposed  as  they 
were  to  the  cold  of  winter  and  the  heat  of  summer,  in  no  part 
of  the  South  was  manifested  any  opposition  to  the  war.  In 
Grant's  Memoirs  he  draws  comparison  between  the  feelings  of 


Chap.  26  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  183 

the  people  of  the  North  and  the  people  of  the  South  during  the 
war, 

"In  the  South,"  says  Grant,  "no  rear  had  to  be  protected. 
All  the  troops  in  the  service  could  be  brought  to  the  front 
to  contest  every  inch  of  ground  threatened  with  invasion  ;  the 
press  of  the  South,  like  the  people  who  stayed  at  home,  were 
loyal  to  the  Southern  cause.  Vast  numbers  in  the  North 
were  hostile  to  the  war.  Troops  zvere  necessary  in  the  North 
to  prevent  prisoners  from  the  Southern  army  being  released, 
armed  and  set  free  by  outside  force.  Copperheads  of  the 
press  magnified  rebel  success  and  belittled  those  of  the 
Union  army." 

Copperheads  were  Northern  Democrats.  For  the  first  two 
years  of  the  war  the  successes  of  the  South's  soldiers  were  so 
great  and  the  success  of  the  North  so  small,  the  latter  could 
hardly  have  been  belittled.  The  election  of  1862  showed  great 
losses  to  the  Republican  party. 

Nicolay  and  Hay  assert  that — 

"In  all  strong  Republican  States  the  opposition  was  tri- 
umphant and  the  administration  defeated." 

This  falling  ofif  of  votes  resulted  from  the  people's  hatred 
of  the  war  and  distrust  of  Lincoln. 

Tarbell,  who  simply  worships  Lincoln,  in  her  Life  of  Lincoln 
says: 

"In  the  winter  of  1862-3  many  and  many  a  man  de- 
serted the  army.  They  refused  to  fight.  Mr.  Lincoln  knew 
that  hundreds  of  soldiers  were  being  urged  by  parents  and 
friends  to  desert.  New  York,  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  Indiana. 
and  Illinois  reversed  their  vote.  Under  the  August  call, 
1864,  for  360,000  militia,  the  people  were  very  uneasy  They 
were  weary  of  the  war,  weary  of  so  much  waste  of  life  and 
money.  Their  feelings  showed  itself  in  an  extensive  form, 
in  open  dissatisfaction  in  Pennsylvania  and  Wisconsin,  which 
broke  out  in  violence  over  the  draft  for  more  men." 

The  numerous  arbitrary  arrests  and  imprisonments  in  dis- 
mal and  distant  fortresses,  of  innocent  citizens,  greatly  alarmed 
the  people ;  murmurs  were  deep  but  not  loud.  A  reign  of  terror 
existed  in  the  Northern  States.  Dissatisfaction  made  itself  felt 
at  the  polls.  The  November  and  October  elections  in  many 
States  opposed  the  Republican  party.     To  lull  this  feeling,  Lin- 


184  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     26 

coin,  Seward  and  Stanton,  as  usual,  resorted  to  trickery  and  de- 
ception. Stanton  became  the  ready  tool  to  perform  the  mean 
and  contemptible  work  of  lying  to  the  public.  From  his  official 
office,  1862,  Stanton  wrote  a  letter,  which  he  had  published  in 
the  newspapers.  The  object  was  two-fold;  first,  to  excuse  Lin- 
coln's arbitrary  arrests,  on  the  ground  that  a  vast  amount  of  trea- 
son (opposition  to  the  war  was  called  treason)  existed  in  the 
Northern  States.  Second,  to  make  the  public  believe  that  the 
resistance  in  the  South  was  declining,  therefore  there  was  no 
further  necessity  to  make  arbitrary  arrests.  Therefore  President 
Lincoln  intended  to  order  the  release  of  citizens  in  the  jails  and 
forts.  To  carry  out  this  lying  scheme,  Stanton  wrote  his  official 
letter,  which,  being  verbose,  I  will  only  give  the  gist,  as  follows : 

"War  Department,  Washington  City,  1862. 
"Treason,"  wrote  Stanton,  "in  the  Northern  States  as- 
tounded the  world." 

This  was  utterly  false.     The  world  was  not  astounded,  nor 
did  the  world  call  adherence  to  the  South  treason. 

"Every  department  in  the  Government  was  paralzyed. 
Disaffection  was  in  the  Senate,  in  the  Federal  Courts,  among 
the  Ministers  returning  from  foreign  countries,  in  the  Cab- 
inet.    Treason  was  in  the  revenue  and  postoffice  services,  in 
the  territorial   government,   in   the    Indian   reserves,   minis- 
terial officers,  among  judges,  governors,  legislators.     Trea- 
son was  in  that  portion  of  the  country  which  was  most  loyal. 
Secret  societies  were  found  furthering  the  work  of  disunion. 
The  judicial  machinery  seemed  as  if  it  had  been  designed 
not  to  sustain  the  Government,  but  to  embarrass  and  be- 
tray it.     The  President  thought  it  his  duty  to  suspend  the 
habeas   corpus   and   arrest  all   suspected   persons.     The   in- 
surrection  is   believed   to   be   declining.     In   view   of   these 
facts  the  President  directs  that  all  political  or  state  prisoners 
nozv  held  in  military  custody  be  released,  on  their  subscrib- 
ing to  a  parole  to  render  no  aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemy." 
Every  word  in  this  letter  was  intended  to  deceive.     First, 
Stanton  makes  a  big  blow  over  what  he  called  treason   (opposi- 
tion to  war)    to  justify  Lincoln's  illegal  arrests ;  then  he  pre- 
tends the  South 's  insurrection  is  declining,  in  order  to  make  a 
decent  excuse  for  Lincoln's  pretense  of  stopping  the  illegal  ar- 
rests ;  then  he  falsely  states  that  Lincoln  has  ordered  the  pris- 
oners released.     To  carry  out  the  deception,  Stanton  issued  the 
following  order : 


Chap.  26  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  185 

"War  Department,  Washington  City,  Nov.  22,  1862. 
"Order  First.  That  all  persons  now  in  military  custody, 
etc.,  be  discharged  from  further  military  restraint. 
"Bv  order  of  Secretary  of  War. 
(Signed^  "E.  D.  TOWNSEND." 

Now,  mark  this  mean  lie.  Lincoln  had  no  intention  of  direct- 
ing the  prisoners  released.  Order  First  was  for  the  people  to 
see,  not  for  jailers  to  obey.  Only  two  days  after  issuing  the 
above  order  Stanton  sent  a  secret  order  to  the  jailers,  as  fol- 
lows : 

"Washington,  November  24,  1862.     " 
"Commanding  Officer,  Fort : 

"None  of  the  prisoners  conilned  at  your  post  will  he  re- 
leased on  orders  of  the  War  Department  of  the  22nd  inst.. 
•without  special  instructions  from  this  Department. 
"Bv  order  of  Secretary  of  War. 

"E.  D.  TOWNSEND." 

American  Bastiles,  page  ySy. 

In  Rhodes'  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  IV,  p.  165.  he 
has  this: 

"One  of  the  results  of  the  elections  of  November  and 
October  was  that  Stanton  issued  an  order  which,  after  a  for- 
mal delay,  effected  the  discharge  from  military  custody  of 
practically  all  the  political  prisoners." 

Rhodes  makes  no  mention  of  Stanton's  second  order,  sent 
to  rescind  the  first;  he  makes  a  mistake  when  he  says  the  pris- 
oners were  practically  released  from  custody  on  Stanton's  first 
order.  Marshall,  in  American  Bastiles,  states  that  the  second 
order  prevented  the  first  being  obe3'ed,  and  that  the  greater  num- 
ber of  the  prisoners  in  Forts  Lafayette  and  Delaware  (if  not  in 
all  other  forts)  were  not  discharged  until  late  in  December,  and 
some  not  until  long  after.  In  explanation  of  Mr.  Lincoln's 
great  unpopularity  during  his  life.  General  Piatt  says: 

"Lincoln  was  a  minority  President,  and  had  no  hold 
on  the  affections  of  the  people." 

At  no  time  did  the  living  Lincoln  have  any  hold  on  the  affec- 
tions of  the  people.  Even  before  he  took  his  seat  the  great  body 
of  the  people  distrusted  and  dishked  him.  His  adorer,  Miss 
Tarbell,  testifies  to  this. 

In  Vol.  I.,  p.  398,  Miss  Tarbell  says : 


1 86  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     26 

"Before  Mr.  Lincoln  left  Springfield  for  Washington, 
the  North  was  desperate  and  helpless.  All  the  bitterness 
and  confusion  centered  about  Mr.  Lincoln.  The  rapid 
disintegration  which  followed  j\Tr.  Lincoln's  election  filled 
the  North  with  dismay.  A  furious  clamor  broke  over  Mr. 
Lincoln's  head.  His  election  had  caused  the  trouble.  What 
could  he  do  to  stop  it?" 

Had  Lincoln  been  true  to  the  Constitution  and  the  princi- 
ples of  'y^y,  he  could  have  stopped  it  in  24  hours.  The  people 
were  afraid  Lincoln  meant  war.  Had  he  told  them,  as  Buchanan  • 
did,  that  he  had  no  intention  of  inaugurating  a  war  of  conquest. 
the  'uneasiness  of  the  people  would  have  vanished  into  thin  air. 
Over  two-thirds  of  the  people  greatly  disliked  and  distrusted  the 
Republican  party,  which  w^s  chiefly  known  by  its  fierce,  vindictive 
hate  of  the  Union,  of  the  South,  and  of  the  United  States  Con- 
stitution. The  majority  of  the  Republican  party  distrusted  Lin- 
coln. They  wanted  Seward  or  Chase.  The  latter  would  have 
made  a  far  more  humane,  honest  President  than  either  Seward 
or  Lincoln. 

In  Vol.  II,  page  65,  Tarbell  says: 

"In  1 861  a  perfect  storm  of  denunciation  broke  over 
Mr.  Lincoln's  head.  The  whole  North  was  angry  ;  impeach- 
ment was  threatened.  Fremont  was  talked  of  to  put  in  his 
place." 

This  dissatisfaction  did  not  cease  or  abate  during  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's term  in  office.  Even  the  dread  of  arbitrary  arrest  and 
imprisonment  did  not  wholly  quell  the  people  into  silence.  In 
the  army  great  dissatisfaction  prevailed. 

In  McClnre's  Magazine,  January,  1893,  p.  165,  Tarbell 
says : 

"Many  and  many  a  man  deserted  in  the  winter  of  1862-3 
because  of  Lincoln's  emancipation  proclamation.  The  sol- 
diers did  not  believe  that  Lincoln  had  the  right  to  issue  it. 
They  refused  to  fight.  Lincoln  knew  that  hundreds  of  the 
soldiers  were  being  urged  by  parents  and  friends,  hostile  to 
him  and  his  administration,  to  desert." 

In  1864  the  opposition  to  the  war  and  to  Lincoln  was  vio- 
lent and  bitter,  and  almost  universal.  Tarbell  describes  the  peo- 
ple's feelings  of  that  year  as  follows : 

"In  1864  the  awful  brutality  of  the  war  came  upon  the 
people  as  never  before.     There  was  a  revolution  of  feeling 


Chap.  26  Facts  and  FAr.SKHoons.  187 

against  the  sacrifice  going  on.  All  the  complaints  that  had 
been  urged  against  Mr.  Lincoln  broke  out  afresh  ;  the  draft 
was  talked  of  as  if  it  were  the  arbitrary  freak  of  a  tyrant. 
It  was  declared  that  Lincoln  had  violated  constitutional 
rights,  declared  that  he  had  violated  personal  liberty,  and 
the  liberty  of  the  press.  It  was  said  that  Lincoln  had  been 
guilty  of  all  the  abuses  of  a  military  dictatorship.  Much 
bitter  criticism  was  made  of  his  treatment  of  the  South's 
peace  commissioners.  It  was  declared  that  the  Confeder- 
ates were  anxious  to  make  peace.  It  was  declared  that  Lin- 
coln was  so  blood-thirsty  he  was  unwilling  to  use  any  means 
but  force.  The  despair,  the  indignation  of  the  country  in 
this  dreadful  time  was  all  centered  on  Mr.  Lincoln." 

Republican   writers   give   positive   evidence   that   every   one 
of  the  above  charges  was  true.     President  Lincoln — 

Had  violated  personal  liberty. 
Had  violated  constitutional  rights. 
Had  violated  the  liberty  of  the  press. 
Had  been  guilty  of  all  the  abuses  of  a  military  dictator. 
Had  repulsed  the   Confederate  peace  commissioners. 
Had  refused  to  use  any  means  except  bloody  force  to  attain 
peace. 

No  man  who  reads  Republican  history  can  deny  one  of  the 
above  charges. 

At  that  time  the  people  of  the  North  did  not  know  that  Lin- 
coln himself  had  confessed  to  Medill,  as  related  by  Tarbell,  that 
he,  Lincoln,  had  begun  the  war  at  the  demand  of  Medill.  Though 
not  having  this  evidence,  the  people  felt  in  their  hearts  that  Lin- 
coln was  responsible  for  the  awful  war.  Not  until  Miss  Tarbell. 
in  1895,  related  Medill's  confession  of  his  part  in  the  wicked  work 
of  deluging  the  land  with  blood  was  it  known  that  Lincoln  had 
knowingly,  deliberately,  of  set  purpose,  plunged  the  country  into 
war  at  Medill's  recjuest.  Never  should  Lincoln's  words  to  Me- 
dill be  forgotten : 

"You  asked  for  war ;  I  have  given  you  what  you  asked 
for.  You  demanded  war.  I  have  given  you  what  you  demand- 
ed. You  are  chiefly  responsible  for  all  the  blood  that  has 
flowed." 


1 88  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     27 


CHAPTER  XXVII. 

What  a  Battle  Meant  to  Lincoln.     Greeley  Prays  Lincoln  for 
Peace.     Rosecrans,  Grant,  Hallack  on  the  People's  Hatred  of 
the  War.     Soldiers  Dislike  Lincoln.     Judge  Curtis  on  Lin- 
coln's   Usurpation.     Republican    Writers,    Rhodes,    Morse, 
Hapgood,  Bancroft  and  Others  Laud  Despotism. 

As  illustrative  of  Lincoln's  character,  General  Piatt  says : 

"A  battle  to  Lincoln  meant  the  killing  and  wounding  of 
a  certain  number  of  men,  the  consequences  to  be  counted 
like  a  sum  in  arithmetic.  Lincoln  faced  and  lived  through 
the  awful  responsibility  of  the  war  with  the  courage  that 
came  from  indifference.'" 

Piatt  does  not  mean  indifference  as  to  the  result  of  the  war ; 
that  Lincoln  was  certain  of,  if  only  the  Northern  people  would 
not  force  him  to  end  it  too  soon  but  indifference  to  the  suffering 
caused  by  the  war.  Piatt  says  Lincoln  was  by  nature  incapa- 
ble of  sympathy.  Greeley,  on  the  contrary,  seemed  to  have 
possessed  the  capacity  to  feel  pity  and  sympathy  for  the  agonies 
the  war  caused  the  people  of  the  North,  and  even  gave  some 
little  thought  to  the  suffering  South.  When  Lincoln  refused 
to  see  or  to  hear  the  Confederate  commissioners,  Clement  Clay 
and  James  P.  Holcomb,  Greeley  wrote  Lincoln  a  letter  protest- 
ing against  that  refusal,  in  which  he  painted  a  heart-rending 
picture  of  the  bleeding,  bankrupt,  almost  dying  country.  Greeley 
said  he  shuddered  at  the  prospect  of  more  conscriptions,  of  fur- 
ther wholesale  devastations  and  more  rivers  of  human  blood. 
He  said  to  Lincoln:  "There  is  a  widespread  conviction  that 
the  administration  is  not  anxious  for  peace,  and  does  not  im- 
prove proffered  opportunities  to  achieve  it."  So  far  as  I  can 
learn  Greeley  was  the  only  prominent  man  in  the  Republican 
party  who,  during  that  dreadful  war,  and  that  still  more  dreadful 
reconstruction  period,  manifested  the  least  desire  to  stop  the 
devastation  suffered  by  the  South.  As  further  evidence  of  oppo- 
sition to  Lincoln   may  be  stated  the  following: 

"General  Rosecrans  reported  to  Washington  the  exist- 
ence in  the  Western  States  of  secret  organizations  of  men 
bound  by  oath  to  co-operate  with  the  Confederates,  to  the 
number  of  400,000.  Nicolay  and  Hay  put  the  number  at 
350,000." 


Chap.  27  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  189 

And  the  following  in  Grant's  Memoirs,  Vol.  II.,  p.  323,  is 
significant : 

"During  August,  1864,  Halleck  informed  me  that  there 
was  an  organized  scheme  on  foot  to  resist  the  draft,  and 
that  it  might  be  necessary  to  withdraw  troops  from  the  field 
to  put  it  down." 

McClure  says : 

"There  was  no  period  from  January,  1864,  until  Sep- 
tember 3  when  McCIellan  would  not  have  defeated  Lincoln 
for  President." 

Secretary  of  War  Stanton,  when  at  death's  door,  said  to 
General  Piatt: 

"When  Lincoln  visited  the  camps  fears  were  felt  at 
headquarters  that  the  soldiers  would  insult  him,  and  orders 
were  issued  to  cheer  the  President  when  he  appeared." 

Yet  it  now  suits  Republicans  to  pretend  that  Lincoln  was 
almost  adored  during  his  life. 

The  soldiers  must  have  had  very  bitter  feelings  toward  Lin- 
coln, if  in  a  time  like  that  they  felt  like  insulting  him.  Though 
half  fed,  though  ragged,  though  many  were  shoeless  and  nearly 
all  tentless,  the  soldiers  of  the  South  would  have  received  their 
President  at  any  time  with  acclamations  of  joy. 

Stanton  also  said  to  Piatt: 

"All  the  time  our  huge  army  lay  coiled  about  Washing- 
ton, a  distrust  of  the  Lincoln  Government  was  insiduously 
cultivated  among  the  men." 

Private  soldiers  are  not  fools ;  while  in  the  ranks  under  the 
rule  of  officers,  they  dare  not  talk  aloud,  but  they  talk  to  each 
other  freely.  The  men  in  the  ranks  were  not  ignorant  of  Lin- 
coln's treachery.  They  knew  that  in  New  York  the  conscript- 
ing machines  had  been  put  in  quarters  where  working  men  are 
most  numerous ;  they  knew  that  these  machines  had  been  put 
in  these  districts  where  the  Democratic  votes  went  largely  against 
the  administration ;  they  knew  how  the  working  men  revolted 
against  this  injustice,  how  they  rose  and  wrecked  the  houses  in 
which  the  cursed  drafting  machines  were  at  work.  The  private 
soldiers  had  enough  to  resent  and  did  resent.  The  millions  paid 
in  pensions  have  sealed  their  lips.  Money  seals  the  lips  of  the 
G.  A.  R.  on  the  wrongs  of  the  war. 


iQo  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     27 

B.  F.  Butler,  whose  very  soul  delighted  in  despotic  meas- 
ures, in  his  book   says: 

"During  the  whole  war  the  Lincoln  Government  was 
rarely  aided,  but  was  usuall}'  impeded  by  the  decisions  of 
the  Supreme  Court,  so  that  President  Lincoln  was  obliged 
to  suspend  the  writ  of  habeas  cori)us  in  order  to  relieve 
himself  of  the  rulings  of  the  court." 

In  1862  Benjamin  R.  Curtis,  of  the  Supreme  Court,  wrote 
and  published  a  little  work  showing  Lincoln's  usurpations, 
entitled:     "Executive  Power." 

"The  President,"  said  Judge  Curtis,  "has  made  him- 
self a  legislator.  He  has  enacted  penal  laws  governing 
citizens  of  the  United  States.  He  has  superadded  to  his 
rights  as  commander  the  power  of  a  usurper.  He  has  es- 
tablished a  military  despotism.  He  can  now  use  the  au- 
thority he  has  assumed  to  make  himself  master  of  our  lives, 
our  liberties,  our  properties,  with  power  to  delegate  his  mas- 
tership to  such  satraps  as  he  may  select." 

If  this  be  true,  and  no  man  has  or  can  deny  it,  Lincoln  was 
guilty  of  a  crime  blacker  than  Benedict  Arnold's.  Yet,  mark 
how  mildly  Judge  Curtis  talks  of  that  crime.  He  says,  "President 
Lincoln  can  now  use  the  authority  he  has  usurped."  Curtis,  as 
every  man  in  the  Northern  States,  well  knew  that  Lincoln  at  that 
time  was  using  his  usurped  powers  every  day  of  his  life.  Lalor's 
Encyclopedia  states  that  the  records  of  the  Provost  Marshal's 
office  in  Washington  show  that  38,000  political  prisoners  filled 
the  bastiles  of  America.  These  men  were  accused  of  no  crime, 
of  no  offense  known  to  the  law  of  the  land.  They  were  Dem- 
ocrats. All  Democrats  were  "suspects."  Stanton  and  Seward 
were  commissioned  by  Lincoln  to  arrest  and  imprison  "suspects." 
Rhodes  thinks  Lalor's  estimate  of  38,000  is  exaggerated,  but 
when  one  considers  it  was  the  nature  of  Seward  and  Stanton  to 
revel  in  the  use  of  power,  and  that  nf^ither  of  t^i^^se  men  ever 
gave  one  sign  of  possessing  the  quality  of  mercy,  pity  or  justice, 
one  can  more  easily  believe  that  Lalor  underrates  more  than  over- 
rates the  number  of  victims.  To  show  how  strangely  a  worship 
of  dead  or  living  despots  demoralizes  the  human  mind,  I  ofifer 
the  following  comments  on  Judge  Curtis'  little  work,  "Executive 
Power."  made  by  John  T.  Morse,  aiithor  of  LiiT^oln  in  one  of  the 
American    Statesmen   "series,"   pubHshed   in    1892: 

"It  was  unfortunate,"  says  Mr.  Morse,  "that  the  country 
should  hear  such  phrases  launched  by  a  Chief  Justice  against 
deeds'  done  under  the  order  of  the  President." 


Chap.  27  Facts  and  FAT.SF.TTonns.  191 

Had  it  come  to  this,  that  an  American  President's  illegal 
deeds  shall  not  be  criticised?'  Does  Mr.  Morse  think  it  ric^ht  to 
conceal  Presidential  acts  from  the  country,  from  the  people  ?  This 
is  indeed  imperial  practice. 

In  reply  to  the  people's  outcry  against  illegal  arrests,  Lin- 
coln argued  that  he  had  the  right.  His  arguments  were  as  fal- 
lacious and  as  shallow  as  any  second  rate  lawyer's  hired  to  de- 
fend a  bad  case.  Lincoln's  defense  of  his  crime  only  made  it 
the  more  odious.  Some  daring  man  had  the  courage  to  criticise. 
Of  this,  Morse  coolly  remarks : 

"It  was  undesirable  to  confute  the  President's  logic  on 
this  question." 

In  his  History  of  the  United  States,  Rhodes  frankly  says: 
"Mr.  Lincoln  stands  responsible  for  the  casting  into 
prisons  citizens  of  the  United  States  on  orders  as  arbitrary 
as  the  letrcs  dc  cachet  of  Louis  XIV.  of  France,  instead  of 
their  arrest,  as  in  Great  Britain  in  her  crisis,  on  legal  war- 
rants." 

Lincoln  himself  boasted  that  he  was  responsible  for  all  arbi- 
trary arrests  and  imprisonments.  He  alone  was  the  foundation  of 
power.     On  page  232,  Vol.  3,  of  Rhodes'  History,  he  remarks : 

"Mr.  Lincoln's  extra  judicial  proceedings  were  inexpe- 
dient, unnecessary,  wrong,  yet  the  great  principles  of  lib- 
erty up  to  the  present  time  have  not  been  invalidated." 

The  despotism  of  that  time  has  so  demoralized  men's  minds, 
many  men  seem  now  ready  to  welcome  the  advent  of  any  coming 
despot.  In  an  article  published  February,  1903,  in  Scribiicr's 
Magazine,  Mr.  Rhodes  too  plainly  shows  the  deep  demoraliza- 
tion of  his  own  mind  on  the  question  of  human  liberty.  Rhodes 
says: 

"Mr.  Lincoln  assumed  extra  legal  powers,  at  the  same  time 
trying  to  give  to  those  illegal  acts  the  color  of  legality.  Lin- 
coln has  made  a  precedent  which  future  riders  will  imitate. 
What  Lincoln  excused  and  defended  will  be  assumed  as  the 
right  for  rulers  to  follow." 

Mr.  Rhodes'  judgment  is  so  demoralized  by  the  worship  of  a 
despot  he  sees  no  danger  in  the  precedent  set  by  Lincoln  of  usurp- 
ing power.  Not  so  with  wiser  heads.  The  Supreme  Court  saw 
and  bemoaned  the  danger. 

"Wicked  men,"  said  that  court,  when  rendering  its  de- 
cision on  the  Millegan  case,  "ambitious  of  power,  with  con- 


192  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     27 

tempt  of  law  in  their  hearts,  may  fill  the  place  once  occupied 
by  Washington  and  Lincoln,  and  if  the  right  of  arbitrary  ar- 
rests and  other  extra  judicial  acts  is  conceded,  the  dangers 
to  human  liberty  are  frightful  to  contemplate." 

Why  did  that  court  couple  the  names  Washington  and  Lin- 
coln together?  The  one  a  respecter  of  law,  the  other  a  law- 
breaker of  the  most  unscrupulous  stripe?  Was  that  court  truck- 
ling to  the  despotism  that  ruled  the  land  ?  Was  it  afraid  to  speak 
out  boldly,  and  denounce  Lincoln  as  the  most  dangerous  law 
breaker  America  has  produced?  To  laud,  to  condone  the  crime 
of  breaking  laws,  of  usurping  authority,  is  to  invite  the  recur- 
rence of  despotism,  is  to  encourage  wicked  men  to  follow  in  Lin- 
coln's footsteps,  and  make  themselves,  as  Judge  Curtis  said,  "the 
masters  of  our  lives,  our  liberties,  our  properties." 

Rhodes  remarks : 

"It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  the  ruler  (Mr.  Rhodes 
seems  to  be  fond  of  the  word  ruler)  of  a  Republic  which 
sprang  from  a  resistance  to  the  English  King  and  Parlia- 
ment, should  exercise  more  arbitrary  power  than  any  Eng- 
lishman since  Oliver  Cromwell,  and  that  many  of  his  acts 
should  be  worthy  of  a  Tudor." 

Many  were  worthy  of  the  most  despotic  Caesar  that  ever 
ruled  Rome.  To  the  lovers  of  freedom,  the  fact  Mr.  Rhodes  calls 
"interesting"  is  more  alarming  than  interesting.  It  shows  how 
easy  wicked  men,  if  in  high  office  in  this  country,  can  overthrow 
civil  law  and  rob  the  people  of  every  right  they  possess.  It  fur- 
ther shows  how  men  are  prone  to  fall  at  the  feet  of  usurpers  and 
worship. 

Even  in  the  darkest  days  of  Lincoln's  rule  there  were  men  of 
his  own  party  who  were  less  tolerant  of  despotism  than  modern 
Republican  writers.  The  New  York  Post,  a  Republican  paper, 
had  the  courage  to  disapprove  of  and  to  denounce  arbitrary  ar- 
rests and  imprisonments  of  men  for  criticizing  Lincoln's  despotic 
acts. 

"No  government,"  said  the  Poi,  "and  no  authorities 
are  to  be  held  as  above  criticism,  or  e ,  cu  denunciation.  We 
know  of  no  other  way  of  correcting  ti^nr  faults,  of  restrain- 
ing their  tyrannies,  than"  by  open  and  bold  discussion." 

There  was  no  lack  in  the  6o's  of  mean  and  contemptible  souls 
eager  and  ready  with  open  arms  to  embrace  despotism,  as  there 
is  now  no  lack  of  despot-loving  men  to  beckon  on  the  coming 


Chap.  2^  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  193 

of  despotism.  E.  C.  Ingersoll,  candidate  for  Congress  during 
Lincoln's  life,  in  a  public  speech,  joyously  announced  the  advent 
of  despotism  and  the  overthrow  of  American  liberty,  using  the 
following  words : 

"President  Lincoln  is  now  clothed  with  power  as  full  as 
that  of  the  Czar  of  Russia.  It  is  now  necessary  for  the  peo- 
ple of  this  country  to  become  familiar  with  that  power  and 
with  Lincoln's  right  to  use  it." 

The  Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher  welcomed  despotism  with 
a  broad,  smiling  face  and  open  arms.  In  a  public  address  this 
so-called  follower  of  the  Christ,  who  taught  the  Democratic  doc- 
trine of  equal  rights,  spoke  as  follows: 

"I  know  it  is  said  President  Lincoln  is  not  the  Govern- 
ment, that  the  Constitution  is  the  Government.  What!  A 
sheep-skin  parchment  a  government !  President  Lincoln  and 
his  Cabinet  are  now  the  Government,  and  men  have  now 
got  to  take  their  choice  whether  they  will  go  with  their  Gov- 
ernment or  against  it.  ' 

It  would  have  been  more  correct  had  Beecher  said,  "Men 
have  now  to  choose  whether  they  will  go  with  Mr.  Lincoln  or  \a 
some  dungeon  cell."  Before  Lincoln  established  despotic  rule, 
how  differently  men  felt  and  spoke  of  American  liberty,  of  the 
danger  of  losing  it.  Daniel  Webster  warned  the  people  against 
executive  power. 

"The  contest,"  said  Webster,  "for  ages  has  been  to  res- 
cue liberty  from  executive  power.  On  the  long  list  of  the 
champions  of  human  freedom,  there  is  not  one  name  dimmed 
by  the  reproach  of  advocating  the  extension  of  executive 
authority.  Through  all  the  histories  of  the  contests  for 
liberty,  executive  power  has  been  regarded  as  the  lion  that 
must  be  caged,  it  has  always  been  dreaded  as  the  great  ob- 
ject of  danger.  Our  security  lies  in  our  watchfulness  of 
executive  power.  I  will  not  trust  executive  power  to  keep 
the  vigils  of  liberty.  Encroachments  must  be  resisted  at 
every  step.  We  are  not  to  wait  till  great  mischief  comes, 
till  the  Government  is  overthrown  or  liberty  put  in  extreme 
jeopardy.  We  would  be  unworthy  sons  of  our  fathers  were 
we  to  so  regard  questions  affecting  freedom." 

Where  were  the  worthy  sons  of  our  fathers  in  the  6o's  ?  Many 
were  immured  in  the  Northern  bastiles.  Those  in  the  South  were 
in  the  ranks  bravely  fighting  to  drive  back  Lincoln's  invading 


194  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     27 

legions — legions  sent  down  on  a  free  people  to  kill,  conquer  or 
annihilate. 

Before  Lincoln  rushed  on  carnage,  while  Greeley  in  the  col- 
umns of  his  Tribune  was  doing  his  best  to  prevent  that  awful 
crime,  the  Boston  Atlas  was  doing  its  best  to  spur  Lincoln  on  to 
make  the  rush.  The  following  is  a  specimen  of  the  Atlas'  tone. 
temper  and  ferocity: 

"Draw  the  sword !  Throw  away  the  scabbard !  Hurl 
100.000  men  on  the  South  to  subjugate.  Let  us  never  cease 
until  South  Carolina  is  a  desert,  a  desolate  land  sown  with 
salt,  that  every  passer-by  shall  wag  his  head." 

Why  this  worse  than  human  hate?  Why  this  fiercer  than 
tiger's  rage  ?  Carolina  had  only  done  what  the  Republican  party 
had  long  wanted  her  to  do,  had  invited  her  to  do.  Soon  after 
Carolina's  secession,  in  a  speech,  Wendell  Phillips  said : 

"No  man  has  a  right  to  be  surprised  at  this  state  of 
things.  It  is  just  what  we  disunionists  have  attempted  to 
bring  about.     Thank  God  disunion  has  come  at  last!" 

Was  it  possible  as  the  war  progressed  that  these  men  forgot 
their  own  advocacy  of  disunion?  If  they  remembered  how  could 
they  justify  their  insane  hate  of  a  people  whose  only  crime  was 
defending  themselves  against  armed  invaders? 

It  has  been  said  a  thousand  times  that  had  Mr.  Lincoln  lived 
through  his  second  term  there  would  have  been  for  the  conquered 
South  no  horrors  of  the  so-called  reconstruction  period.  'A  care- 
ful study  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  real,  not  his  apotheosized,  character 
will  not  warrant  that  conclusion.  Let  the  reader  consider  the  fol- 
lowing facts  and  judge  for  himself: 

1st.  Before  Air.  Lincoln  came  into  Presidential  power  he 
had  openly,  from  the  floor  of  Congress,  declared  the  right  of  se- 
cession and  the  right  of  the  South  to  secede  and  to  ,  form  an 
independent  government  of  her  own. 

2nd.  After  Mr.  Lincoln  became  President  and  held  in  his 
hands  the  reins  of  all  the  government  machincr\'.  at  the  insti- 
gation of  such  soulless  men  as  Medill  of  Chicago,  Senator  Chan- 
dler of  Michigan,  Seward  of  New  York,  and  the  urgency  of  such 
South-hating  journals  as  the  Chicago  Tribune  and  Boston  Atlas, 
he  not  only  turned  his  back  on  his  own  publicly  proclaimed  prin- 
ciples of  right,  but  turned  his  back  on  the  principles  and  issues 
of  his  own  party,  which  had  been  delivered  from  a  thousand  ros- 
trums since  the  organization  of  his  party  in  1854. 


Chap.  2"/  Facts  and  Falsehoods. 


195 


3rd.  Yielding  to  the  influence  of  bloody-minded  men  and 
journals,  Mr.  Lincoln  inaugurated  the  most  unnecessary,  cruel, 
wicked  war  of  the  Nineteenth  Century. 

Never  will  it  be  forgotten  that  Medill  of  the  Chicago  Trib- 
une bears  witness  to  the  awful  fact  that  Mr.  Lincohi  began  the 
war  of  conquest  on  the  South.  Never  will  it  be  forgotten  that 
Medill  of  the  Chicago  Tribune,  as  stated  in  Tarbell's  Life  of 
Lincoln,  testifies  that  in  1864  Abraham  Lincoln  said  to  him.  in 
the  presence  of  Stanton,  Secretary  of  War,  and  other  public  men 
in  high  office : 

"After  Boston,  Chicago  has  been  the  chief  instrument 
in  bringing  this  war  on  the  country.  It  is  you,  Medill,  who 
is  largely  responsible  for  making  blood  flow  as  it  has.  You 
called  for  war  until  you  got  it.     /  have  given  it  to  you." 

Great  God !     What  a  confession  is  this !     In  all  the  black 

and  bloody  calendar  of  crime  did  ever  man  before  confess  him- 
self openly  of  so  stupendous  a  crime  as  this?  "You,  Medill, 
called  for  zvar  until  you  got  it.     I  hai'C  given  it  to  you." 

And  this  when  these  very  men  had  proclaimed  and  promul- 
gated the  lie  that  the  South  began  the  war ;  this  when  the  South 
had  prayed  for  peace  and  an  equitable  settlement  of  their  part- 
nership affairs.  When  this  confession  issued  from  Lincoln's 
lips  blood  was  still  flowing  like  water  on  battlefields,  the  rivers 
in  the  South  were  still  running  red  with  the  heart's  blood  of 
brave  men  of  the  North  and  of  the  South.  A  thousand  hos- 
pitals in  both  lands  were  filled  with  wounded,  mutilated,  dying, 
pain-racked  soldiers^  and  the  air  all  over  America  was  thick  and 
sick  with  the  wailings  of  war-made  widows  and  war-made  or- 
phans. Oh,  if  the  men  who  so  wantonly  begun  that  war  had 
human  hearts  in  their  breasts,  what  anguish  of  remorse  must 
have  wrung  and  stung  their  consciences !  Yet  nowhere  have 
I  found  any  evidence  that  remorse  touched  them  for  their  awful* 
crime.  It  is  recorded  that  Lincoln  suffered  intense  anxiety  when 
the  success  of  his  wicked  scheme  of  conquest  seemed  doubtful, 
but  when  victory  appeared  in  sight  his  joy  was  unalloyed  by 
any  thought  of  the  awful  price  paid  for  it.  The  men  who  best 
knew  Lincoln  testify  that  the  suffering  of  his  own  soldiers  gave 
him  little  or  no  personal  concern.  In  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln, 
page  344,  he  says: 

"Lincoln's  compassions  could  be  stirred  deeply  by  an 
object  present,  but  never  by  an  object  absent  and  unseen. 
Mr.  Lincoln  was  not  an  ardent  sympat:hizer  with  suffering 


196  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     27 

of  anv  sort  which  he  did  not  witness  with  the  eye  of  the 
flesh." 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  of  so  plastic  a  na- 
ture as  to  be  easily  induced  to  plunge  the  country  into  war  by 
such  men  as  Medill  and  Chandler  of  Michigan,  is  it  not  likely  had 
he  lived  through  his  second  term  the  Medills  and  Chandlers  would 
as  easily  have  induced  him  to  pursue  their  vindictive  and  tigerish 
policy  toward  the  South  ?  President  Johnson  was  in  favor  of  the 
pacific  policy  it  is  said  that  Lincoln  intended,  but  the  Republican 
leaders  in  a  body  opposed  him,  and  came  near  deposing  him  from 
power.  Though  impeachment  failed,  the  Presidential  authoritv 
was  so  curtailed,  Johnson's  administration  was  crippled,  but  iii 
spite  of  the  leaders,  Johnson  showed  some  mercy  to  the  South. 
He  made  himself  in  some  degree  a  break-water  to  hold  back  the 
malignant  tide  of  hate  which  the  remorseless  Republican  leaders 
were  almost  frantic  to  roll  over  the  people  of  the  South.  Their 
plan  to  confiscate  the  land  of  the  Southern  whites  and  divide  it 
into  fortv-acre  lots,  and  give  a  lot  to  every  negro  man  in  the  South, 
was  never  carried  out. 

When  the  people  in  the  Northern  States  became  alarmed  at 
President  Lincoln's  bold  usurpation  of  power  and  began  to  loud- 
ly murmur  at  his  arbitrary  arrests  of  influential  citizens  and  their 
imprisonment  in  distant  forts,  John  W.  Forney,  Secretarv  of 
the  Senate  and  close  friend  of  Lincoln's,  through  the  Philadelphia 
Press,  spurred  on  Lincoln  to  further  outrages  on  the  people's  lib- 
erties. As  a  sample  of  Forney's  advice,  I  give  the  following  from 
the  Philadelphia  Press: 

"Silence  everv  tongue ;  seal  every  mouth  that  does  not 
speak  with  respect  of  our  cause  (conquest  of  the  South) 
and  of  our  flag.  Let  us  cease  to  talk  of  safeguards,  of  laws 
and  restrictions,  of  dangers  to  liberty." 

In  Bancroft's  Life  of  Seward,  published  in  1899,  he  gives 
some  account  of  Mr.  Seward's  illegal  arrests.  On  page  276,  Ban- 
croft says : 

"Arbitrary  arrests  and  imprisonments  were  made  to 
prevent,  rather  than  to  Hmish  treason.  Of  course  it  would 
have  been  unsafe  to  he  frank  about  such  a  thing" 

Despots  never  think  it  safe  to  be  frank  about  their  deeds  of 
despotism.  Men  were  not  arrested  and  imprisoned  for  what 
they  had  done,  but  for  what  possibly  they  might  cio,  On  tbis 
Mr.  Bancroft  complacently  remarks: 


Chap.  2y  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  197 

"There  is  no  occasion,  however,  to  apologize  for  arbitra- 
ry arrests." 

None  in  the  world.  Nobody  wants  apolos^ies.  What  is 
wanted  is  hatred,  deep,  deadly,  undying-,  ineradicable,  red-hot, 
holy  hatred  of  despotism,  not  apologies. 

Mr.  Bancroft  says: 

"The  least  excusable  feature  of  these  arrests  was  the 
treatment  of  the  prisoners.  Month  after  month  they  were 
crowded  together  in  gloomy,  damp  casemates,  where  even 
the  dangerous  pirates  captured  on  the  South's  privateers 
(the  South  had  no  pirates)  and  the  soldiers  taken  in  battle 
ought  not  to  have  remained  long.  Many  had  committed 
no  overt  act.  Many  were  editors  and  politicians  of  good 
character  and  honor.  It  (the  power  to  make  illegal  ar- 
rests) offered  rare  opportunities  for  the  gratification  of  per- 
sonal enmity  and  the  display  of  power  by  United  States 
Marshals  and  military  officers.  Seward  cannot  be  blamed 
for  this." 

Bancroft  here  assumes  that  Seward,  Stanton  and  Lincoln 
were  not  as  likely  to  abuse  the  power  of  arrest  as  United  States 
Marshals  and  military  officers.  The  assumption  is  worthy  of 
a  simpleton.  Every  arrest  ordered  by  Seward.  Stanton  and  Lin- 
coln was  inspired  by  personal  or  political  spite.  These  three 
men  were  peculiarly  vindictive  toward  any  man  they  even  sus- 
pected of  opposing  their  cruel  war  policy.  General  Piatt,  who 
well  knew  this  triumvirate  of  despots,  said  of  two  of  them : 

"Seward  and  Stanton  fairly  rioted  in  the  enjoyment  of 
power.  They  reveled  in  the  use  of  power.  Stanton  was 
more  vindictive  in  his  dislikes  than  any  man  ever  called  to 
public  station." 

Were  men  of  this  pagan  nature  fit  to  hold  absolute  power 
over  the  liberties  and  lives  of  their  fellow  creatures?  Yet  to 
these  two  unscrupulous,  unfeeling  men,  Lincoln  deputed  the 
rule  he  had  usurped  over  the  people  of  the  Northern  Stateis. 

"No  man,"  remarks  the  simple  Bancroft,  in  his  Life  of 
Seward,  "will  deny  that  Mr.  Seward  sought  and  was  given 
too  much  responsibility." 

This  is  exactly  what  the  writer  of  this  does  deny.  Respon- 
sibility means  the  state  of  being  answerable  for  a  trust.  Neither 
Lincoln,  Seward  or  Stanton  sought  to  be  or  desired  to  be  an- 
swerable to  any  person  or  power  for  any  trust  they  assumed. 


198  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     2y 

They  were  not  answerable.  On  the  contrary,  they  sought  and 
desired  to  exercise  the  powers  they  wrested  from  the  people 
without  accotmtability  to  mortal  or  inimortal  being-. 

In  Vol.  2,  page  254,  of  Mr.  Bancroft's  Life  of  Seward,  he 
sagely  says : 

"Some  of  the  features  of  these  arbitrary  arrests  bore 
a  striking  resemblance  to  the  odious  institution  of  the  ancient 
regime  in  France — the  bastile  and  the  Ictrcs  dc  cachet." 

Were  Mr.  Bancroft  called  on  to  describe  two  peas  as  like 
each  other  as  peas  can  be,  he  would  look  from  one  to  the  other, 
gravely  reflect,  then  solemnly  sa\  : 

"Some  of  the  features  of  this  pea  bear  a  striking  resem- 
blance to  some  of  the  features  of  this  other  pea." 

"The  person  arrested."  says  Mr.  Bancroft,  "was  usually 
seized  at  night.  It  was  found  best  to  take  prominent  men  far 
from  friends  and  sympathizers.  They  were  usually  taken 
to  Fort  Warren  or  other  remote  ])laces.  In  some  cases  from 
one  to  three  months  elapsed  before  the  case  of  the  arrested 
man  was  looked  at.  As  a  rrl?  nrisoners  were  not  told  whv 
they  were  arested.  The  arrested  men  were  deprived  of  their 
valuables,  money,  watches,  rings,  etc.,  and  locked  up  in 
casemates  usually  crowded  with  men  who  had  similar  ex- 
periences. If  any  prisoner  wished  to  send  for  relatives, 
friends,  or  an  attorney,  they  were  told  that  any  prisoner  who 
sought  the  aid  of  an  attorney  would  greatly  prejudice  his 
case.  Appeals  to  Seward.  Lincoln  or  Stanton  a  second, 
third  or  fourth  time  were  all  useless." 

In  conclusion,  Mr.  Bancroft  naively  remarks : 

"There  is,  however,  nothing  to  indicate  that  Mr.  Sew- 
ard was  fond  of  keeping  men  in  prison." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  know  what  facts  and  acts  would 
afford  such  indication  to  men  of  the  Bancroft  sort.  Roman 
histor_\-  relates  that  after  a  long  life  spent  in  evil  deeds,  in  his 
sullen  old  age,  the  Emperor  Tiberius  left  Rome  and  secluded 
himself  in  the  Island  of  Capri,  off  the  coast  of  Southern  Italy. 
Either  to  relieve  the  tedium  of  time  or  to  keep  up  the  practice 
of  cruelty,  the  Emperor  would  order  his  guard  to  seize  any  fish- 
erman or  peasant,  or  other  passer-by.  and  summarily  ])itch  him 
from  the  highest  clifif  into  the  deep  sea  below.  The  unfortunate 
man  was  either  drowned  in  the  sea  or  torn  to  pieces  on  the  jut- 
ting and  jagged  rocks  as  he  fell.     This  done,  the  Emperor  would 


Chap.  28  Facis  wn  Falsehoods. 


199 


I)]aciilly  return  Xo  llic  privacy  of  his  palace,  and  the  ne.Kt  day  as 
he  took  his  niorniui.';  constitutional,  if  he  happenetl  to  see  an- 
other unfortunate  man  passinj^  by,  the  kind-hearted  old  Emperor 
would  gently  order  him  pitched  over  the  cliff  in  the  same  way. 
Were  Mr.  Bancroft  writing  the  life  of  Tiberius,  after  relating 
the  above  little  incidents,  after  describing  the  cries  of  the  poor 
wretches  as  they  fell  from  one  jutting  rock  to  another,  down  to 
the  deep  sea,  Mr.  Bancroft  would  amiably  remark : 

"There  is  nothing,  however,   to  indicate  that  Tiberius 

was  fond  of  ordering  men  thrown  over  steep  cliffs  to  certain 

death." 

On  August  8,  1862,  Stanton  issued  an  order  under  which 
many  thousand  men  were  kidnaped,  hurried  off  to  the  nearest 
military  post  or  depot,  and  i)laced  on  military  duty.  The  expense 
of  the  arrest,  the  conveyance  to  such  post,  also  the  sum  of  five  dol- 
lars reward  to  the  men  who  made  the  arrest,  were  deducted  from 
the  arrested  man's  poor  pay  while  serving  in  the  ranks.  Is  it 
any  wonder  that,  as  Stanton  told  Piatt,  there  was  great  dissatis- 
faction in  the  Union  army,  and  great  dislike  of  Lincoln  among 
the  common  soldiers? 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

Lincoln's  Eagerness  for  Second  Term.  He  is  Elected  by  the  use 
of  the  Army.  B.  F.  Butler's  Story.  The  Crime  of  the  Cen- 
tury. Kepubliaiu  JJ'rifcrs  Unlit  I'cachcrs  of  .iincrican  Boys. 
The  Fox's  Skin. 

Many  men  of  this  day  fancy  Lincoln's  election  to  a  second 
term  proves  that  he  was  the  people's  choice,  and  was  trusted 
and  beloved  by  the  people.  In  this  busy  age  few  men  have 
the  time  to  look  below  the  surface  and  find  facts.  Some  of 
Lincoln's  apotheosis  biographers  boldly  assert  that  Lincoln 
was  indifferent  about  his  re-election.  Others  deem  it  better  to  tell 
the  plain  truth  on  this  question.  Lamon  says  during  his  first 
term  he  was  all  the  time  anxious  to  secure  re-election. 
In  his  Life  of  Lincoln,  McClure  says: 

"Lincoln's  desire  for  re-nomination  was  the  one  thing 
uppermost  in  his  mind  during  the  third  year  of  his  first 
term." 

In  "Our  Presidents,"  page  184,  McClure  says: 


2CXD  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     28 

"A  more  anxious  candidate  I  have  never  seen.  I  could 
hardly  treat  with  respect  Lincoln's  anxiety  about  his  re- 
nomination," 

After  Lincoln's  nomination  for  the  second  term,  but  before 
eieclion,  the  prospects  of  his  re-election  became  very  gloomy. 
Many  of  Lincoln's  friends  predicted  the  success  of  McQel- 
lan.  Mr.  Lincoln  himself  was  almost  in  despair  of  re-elec- 
tion.    In  Vol.  I,  on  this  subject,  Morse  has  this: 

"In  Lincoln's  party  the  foremost  men,  as  the  time  ap- 
proached for  a  second  term,  so  strongly  opposed  Lincoln 
they  determined  to  prevent  his  re-election.  They  called  a 
convention  to  be  held  May  21,  1864,  in  Cincinnati,  Ohio. 
The  call  said:  'Republican  Liberty  is  in  danger.  The  ob- 
ject of  this  call  is  to  arouse  the  people,  and  make  them  real- 
ize that  while  we  are  saturating  Southern  soil  with  the  best 
blood  of  the  country  in  the  name  of  Liberty,  we  have  really 
parted  with  it  at  home.'  " 

Nicolay  and  Hay's  Life  of  Lincoln,  Vol.  2,  page  249,  says : 

"By  August,  1864,  Weed,  Raymond  and  everyone,  even 
Lincoln  himself,  despaired  of  his  re-election.  Raymond, 
Chairman  of  the  Republican  National  Executive  Commit- 
tee, August  22,  1864,  wrote  Lincoln:  T  hear  but  one  report. 
The  tide  is  setting  against  us.' " 

In  "Our  Presidents,"  page  183,  McClure  says: 

"Three  months  after  Lincoln's  renomination  in  Bal- 
timore, his  defeat  by  General  McClellan  was  feared  by  his 
friends  and  conceded  by  Lincoln  himself.  Wade  of  Ohio, 
and  Winter  Davis,  aided  by  Greeley,  published  in  Greeley's 
Tribune,  August  5,  1864,  their  bitter  manifesto  against  Lin- 
coln, in  which  they  charged  him  with  having  committed  a 
more  studied  outrage  on  the  authority  of  the  people  than 
had  ever  before  been  perpetrated." 

In  Holland's  Life  of  Lincoln,  he  says: 

"After  Mr.  Lincoln's  nomination  for  a  second  term,  a 
peculiar  change  came  over  the  spirit  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  friends  ; 
the  thought  became  prevalent  that  a  mistake  had  been  made ; 
simultaneously  and  universally  the  friends  of  the  Adminis- 
tration felt  he  ought  not  to  have  been  nominated  for  a  sec- 
ond term," 

Morse,  in  Vol.  2,  says:  ' 


Chap.  28  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  201 

"Recent  local  elections  in  New  York  and  Massachusetts 
showed  a  striking  reduction  of  Republican  strength." 

In  "The  True  Story  of  a  Great  Life,"  Weik  states  that  Wen- 
dell Phillips  made  stump  speeches  over  New  England  denouncing 
Lincoln,  and  holding  him  up  to  public  ridicule.  At  Cooper  In- 
stitute, 1864,  before  an  immense  audience,  Phillips  said: 

"Lincoln  has  overthrown  Liberty.  I  call  on  the  people 
to  rise  in  their  might  and  see  to  it  that  Lincoln  is  not  elected 
to  a  second  term." 

On  August  14,  Greeley  wrote : 

"Mr.  Oncoln  is  already  beaten.  He  cannot  be  re-elect- 
ed. We  must  have  another  ticket  to  save  us  from  utter  over- 
throw.    Grant,  Butler  or  Sherman  would  do  for  President." 

Chase,  Winter  Davis,  Wade  of  Ohio,  Governor  Andrew  of 
Massachusetts,  were  in  sympathy  with  the  movement  to  prevent 
Lincoln's  re-election.  The  editor  of  the  Cincinnati  Gazette 
wrote : 

"The  people  regard  Mr.  Lincoln's  candidacy  as  a  mis- 
fortune. I  do  not  know  a  Lincoln  man.  In  all  our  corres- 
pondence, which  is  large  and  varied,  are  few  letters  from 
Lincoln  men." 

The  New  York  Sun  said: 

"The  withdrawal  of  Lincoln  and  Fremont,  and  the  nom- 
ination of  a  man  who  would  inspire  confidence,  would  be 
hailed  with  delight." 

In  his  apotheosized  Life  of  Lincoln,  Holland  bears  witness 
to  the  strong  and  general  dissatisfaction  of  the  people  in  1864, 
and  their  desire  for  a  change.  Fremont's  name  was  the  rallying 
cry  with  dissatisfied  Republicans.  Fremont  boldly  denounced 
Lincoln.  .    '   ■  -i^.  ^*^ 

"Had  Mr.  Lincoln,"  said  Fremont,  "remained  faithful 
to  the  principles  he  was  elected  to  defend,  no  schism  could 
have  been  created,  and  no  contest  against  him  could  have 
been  possible.  The  ordinary  rights  secured  under  the  Con- 
stitutions have  been  violated.  The  Administration  has  man- 
aged the  war  for  personal  ends,  and  with  incapacity  and  self- 
ish disregard  for  constitutioanl  rights,  with  violaton  of  per- 
sonal liberty  and  liberty  of  the  press." 

Miss  Tarbell,  who  seems  to  have  written  her  Life  of  Lin- 
coln while  on  her  knees  before  his  image  in  a  sacred  shrine,  says : 


202  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     28 

"In  the  spring  of  1863  a  plot  was  formed  and  favored 
by  all  the  most  prominent  Republican  leaders  to  force  Pres- 
ident Lincoln  to  abdicate,  and  to  put  Vice-President  Hamlin 
in  his  place.  Greeley  thought  he  could  use  such  pressure  on 
Lincoln  as  would  force  him  to  step  down  and  out.  Lincoln 
knew  of  this  plot.  Mr.  Enos  Clark  states  that  in  the  inter- 
view President  Lincoln  had  with  the  committee  of  seventy 
men  from  Missouri^  in  1863..  at  the  moment  the  committer 
was  about  to  leave  he  saw  tears  streaming  down  Lincoln's 
face.  On  getting  to  the  door  Mr.  Clark  looked  back,  and 
instead  of  tears,  Lincoln  was  laughing  heartily  and  joking." 

— Tarbell,  Vol.  IL,  p.  176. 

This  committee  of  seventy  was  anti-Lincoln.  Next  day 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  Chase  gave  the  committee  a  reception, 
and  told  them  he  was  heartily  in  sympathy  with  their  mission. 
The  committee  went  to  New  York  and  was  given  a  great  and 
enthusiastic  meeting  at  Cooper  Institute.  William  Cullen  Bry- 
ant made  a  speech,  and  various  distinguished  men  indulged  in 
violent  denunciation  of  the  Administration  and  threatened  Lin- 
coln with  revolution. 

—Tarbell,  Vol.  II.,  p.  178. 

In  1863  the  New  York  Herald  advocated  Grant  for  tlie  Pres- 
idency. The  great  majority  of  the  Republican  leaders  wanted 
a  change.     Lincoln  knew  of  all  these  efforts. 

"The  despair,  the  indignation  of  the  country  in  this 
dreadful  year  (1863)  all  centered  on  Lincoln.  The  Republi- 
cans were  hopeless  of  re-electing  him.  Amid  this  dreadful 
uproar  of  discontent,  one  cry  alarmed  Lincoln — the  cry  that 
Grant  should  be  presented  for  the  Presidency." 

— Tarbell,  Vol.  II. ,  p.  199. 

Leonard  Sweet,  a  loving  friend  of  Lincoln,  August,  1864, 
in  a  letter  from  New  York  City  to  his  wife,  wrote: 

"The  fearful  things  in  relation  to  this  country  induced 
me  to  stay  a  week.  The  malicious  foes  of  Lincoln  are  get- 
ting up  a  Buffalo  convention  to  supplant  him.  They  are 
Sumner,  Wade,  Plenry  Winter  Davis,  Chase,  Fremont,  Wil- 
son, etc.  The  most  fearful  things  are  probable.  Democrats 
preparing  to  resist  the  draft.  There  is  not  much  hope  ;  unless 
material  changes,  Lincoln's  re-election  is  beyond  any  possi- 
ble hope,  and  is  probably  clear  gone  now." 


Chap.  28  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  203 

Lincoln  himself  believed  he  would  be  defeated.  On  August 
23.  1864.  Lincoln,  fully  understanding  the  danger,  put  on  record 
his  belief  that  he  would  be  defeated.  In  a  speech  bitterly  de- 
nouncing Lincoln  at  a  Republican  meeting  in  Boston,  Wendell 
Phillips  went  so  far  as  to  say,  "Lincoln  and  his  Cabinet  are 
treasonable.     Lincoln  and  Stanton  should  be  impeached." 

The  Chicago  Tribune  denounced  Lincoln  as  the  author  of 
the  negro  riots.  So  eager  was  -Lincoln  for  a  second  term,  so 
intense  his  anxiety,  it  showed  in  his  face.  Miss  Tarbell  de- 
scribes his  looks  during  that  period,  1863-4: 

"Day  by  day,"  says  Miss  Tarbell,  "he  grew  more  hag- 
gard, the  lines  in  his  face  deepened,  it  became  ghastly  gray 
in  color.  Sometimes  he  would  say,  T  shall  never  be  glad 
again.'  When  victory  was  assured  a  change  came  at  once. 
His  form  straightened  up,  his  face  cleared ;  never  had  he  . 
seemed  so  glad." 

Yet  in  the  face  of  all  this  evidence  of  Lincoln's  unpopular- 
ity, it  now  suits  Republicans  to  assert  that  Lincoln  was  trusted 
and  beloved  during  his  lifetime. 

Such  being  the  gloom}-  outlook  for  the  Republican  party 
immediately  preceding  the  Presidential  election  of  1864,  what 
brought  about  the  change?  What  lifted  from  Lincoln's  heart 
its  load  of  despair,  and  filled  it  with  hope?  The  answer  is  easy. 
First  came  a  few  L^nion  victories,  which  indicated  that  the  poor 
Confederates  were  failing  for  want  of  numbers.  Farragut  capt- 
ured Mobile,  Sherman  was  taking  a  holiday  march  over  the 
South,  burning  and  pillaging  to  his  heart's  delight,  no  armed  men 
to  impede  his  progress ;  Sherman's  unresisted  entrance  into  At- 
lanta, Ga.,  his  brilliant  victory  over  the  15.000  xmarmed  women 
and  children  of  that  unfortunate  city,  his  splendid  strategic 
feat  in  driving  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet  the  15,000  Atlanta 
women  and  children  out  of  their  homes,  out  of  the  city — out  into 
the  pathless  woods  to  wander  about  shelterless,  foodless,  and 
after  Atlanta  w^as  tenantless,  its  streets  all  silent  save  where  armed 
men  trampled  over  them,  Sherman's  magnificent  success  in  burn- 
ing every  house  in  the  city,  private  as  well  as  public — these  valiant 
deeds  of  Sherman's  army  served  to  expel  the  despair  from  Lin- 
coln's head  and  let  in  fresh  breezes  of  hope.  In  addition  he  had 
General  B.  F.  Butler  and  others  of  that  calibre  ready  and  willing 
to  do  his  bidding,  regardless  of  honor  or  honesty.  In  his  book 
Butler  relates  how  he  obeyed  orders,  and,  bv  the  use  of  soldiers, 
secured  Lincoln's  election  for  a  second  term. 


204  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     28 

Oh,  if  the  souls  of  liberty-loving  men  of  'y6  take  cognizance 
of  the  workings  of  affairs  in  the  land  they  loved,  and  many  died  to 
free,  how  must  they  mourn  over  the  decadence  of  the  men  of  this 
age — the  men  who  glorify  the  shameful  fact  that  an  American 
President  procured  his  re-election  to  office  by  the  use  of  the  Unit- 
ed States  army  at  the  polls!  Hapgood's  Life  of  Lincoln  con- 
tains the  following  unblushing  paragraph : 

"Charles  A.  Dana  testifies  that  the  whole  power  of  the 
War  Department  was  used  to  secure  Lincoln's  re-election  in 
1864.  There  is  no  doubt  but  this  is  true.  Purists  may 
turn  pale  at  such  things,  but  the  world  wants  no  prettiiied 
portrait  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  Lincoln's  Jesuitical  ability  to  use 
the  fox's  skin  when  the  lion's  proves  too  short  was  one 
part  of  his  enormous  value." 

Think  of  it,  men  of  America !  "Jesuitical  ability  to  trick,  to 
deceive,  to  rob  the  people  of  their  right  to  the  ballot  is,  by  a  mod- 
ern Republican  historian,  not  only  condoned,  but  commended 
as  of  ''enormous  value."  And  any  honest  man,  shocked  at  so  infa- 
mous an  outrage  on  the  rights  of  freemen,  the  Republican,  Hap- 
good,  sarcastically  terms  "purist."  "Purists  may  turn  pale,"  etc. 
In  his  book,  published  in  1892,  General  Butler  proudly  relates  his 
part  in  the  infamous  work  of  using  the  army  at  the  polls.  The 
story  is  this:  The  election  day  was  November  8,  1864.  Lincoln 
had  sent  agents  to  New  York  City  to  spy  out  and  report  how  the 
election  would  go.  The  report  boded  ill  for  Lincoln's  success ; 
in  fact,  indicated  that  New  York  would  give  a  large  majority  for 
General  McClellan.  Lincoln,  Seward  and  Stanton  were  alarmed. 
The  latter  instantly  telegraphed  General  Butler  to  report  to  him 
at  once.  Butler  rushed  to  Washington,  and  Stanton  explained 
the  situation  at  New  York. 

"What  do  you  want  me  to  do?"  asked  Butler. 

"Start  at  once  for  New  York,  take  command  of  the  De- 
partment of  the  East,  relieving  General  Dix.  I  will  send  you 
all  the  troops  you  need." 

"But,"  returned  Butler,  "it  will  not  be  good  politics  to 
relieve  General  Dix  just  on  the  eve  of  election." 

"Dix  is  a  brave  man,"  said  Stanton,  "but  he  won't  do 
anything ;  he  is  very  timid  about  some  matters." 

This  meant  that  General  Dix  was  too  honorable  to  use  the 
United  States  Army  to  control  and  direct  elections. 

"Send  me,"  suggested  the  shrewd  Butler,  "to  New  York 
with  President  Lincoln's  order  for  m^  to  relieve  Dix   in  my 


Chap.  28  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  205 

pocket,  but  I  will  not  use  the  order  until  such  time  as  I  think 
safe.  I  will  report  to  Dix  and  be  his  obedient  servant,  and 
coddle  him  up  until  I  see  proper  to  spring-  on  him  my  order, 
and  take  supreme  command  myself." 

"Very  well,"  assented  Stanton ;  "I  will  send  you  Massa- 
chusetts troops." 

"Oh,  no!"  objected  the  shrewder  Butler,  "it  won't  do  for 
Massachusetts  men  to  shoot  dozvn  Nezv  Yorkers." 

Stanton  saw  this  also  would  be  bad  politics,  so  Grant  was 
ordered  to  send  Western  troops — 5,000  good  troops  and  two 
batteries  of  Napoleon  guns — for  the  purpose  of  shooting  down 
New  Yorkers  should  New  Yorkers  persist  in  the  evil  intention 
of  voting  for  McCIellan. 

When  the  citizens  of  New  York  saw  Butler  and  his  escort 
proudly  prancing  their  horses  on  the  streets  and  saw  the  arrival 
of  5,000  Western  troops  and  the  Napoleon  guns,  there  was  great 
agitation  and  uneasiness  over  the  city.  Newspapers  charged  that 
these  warlike  preparations  were  made  to  overawe  citizens  and 
prevent  a  fair  election.  Butler  was  virtuously  indignant  at  such 
charges.  General  Sanford,  commanding  the  New  York  State 
militia,  called  on  Butler  and  told  him  the  State  militia  was  strong 
enough  to  quell  any  disturbance  that  might  occur  and  he  intended 
to  call  out  his  militia  division  on  election  day.  Butler  arrogantly 
informed  General  Sanford  that  he  (Butler)  had  no  use  for  New 
York  militia ;  he  did  not  know  which  way  New  York  militia 
would  shoot  when  it  came  to  shooting.  General  Sanford  replied 
that  he  would  apply  to  the  Governor  of  the  State  for  orders. 

"I  shall  not  recognize  the  authority  of  your  Governor," 
haughtily  returned  Butler.  "From  what  I  hear  of  Governor 
Seymour  I  may  find  it  necessary  to  arrest  all  I  know  who  are 
proposing  to  disturb  the  peace  on  election  day." 

Butler  well  knew  he  was  the  only  man  in  the  city  who  in- 
tended to  disturb  the  peace  on  election  day.  Butler's  mean  and 
cowardly  soul  gleefully  gloated  over  the  power  he  possessed  to 
bully  and  insult  the  great  State  of  New  York,  its  Governor  and 
militia  officers — power  given  him  by  Lincoln,  whose  orders  he 
had  in  his  pocket  to  relieve  General  Dix,  and  take  command  of 
the  army  under  Dix,  and  hold  himself  ready  on  election  day  to 
shoot  down  New  York  men  at  the  polls  to  secure  the  re-election 
of  President  Lincoln.  On  November  5th  Butler  issued  Order  No. 
I,  the  purpose  of  which,  he  said — 


2o6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     28 

"Is  to  correct  misrepresentations,  soothe  the  fears  of  the 
weak  and  timid  and  allay  the  nervousness  of  the  ill-advised, 
silence  all  false  rumors  circulated  by  men  for  wicked  pur- 
poses, and  to  contradict  once  for  all  false  statements  made  to 
injure  the  Government  in  the  respect  and  confidence  of  the 
people.  The  Commanding  General,"  continues  Butler, 
"takes  occasion  to  declare  that  troops  have  been  detailed  for 
duty  in  this  district  to  preserve  the  peace  of  the  United  States, 
to  protect  public  property,  and  insure  calm  and  quiet  elec- 
tion." 

The  citizens  of  New  York  well  knew  that  the  above  was  one 
tissue  of  falsehood ;  they  knew  that  Butler  and  his  5.000  Western 
troops,  his  batteries  and  Napoleon  guns,  w-ere  there  to  overawe 
the  people  and  force  the  re-election  of  Lincoln. 

"The  Commanding  General,"  continues  Order  No.  i, 
"has  been  pained  to  see  publications  by  some  not  too  well  in- 
formed persons,  that  the  presence  of  the  troops  of  the  United 
States  might  by  possibility  have  an  effect  on  the  free  exercise 
of  the  duty  of  voting  at  the  ensuing  election.  Nothing  is 
further  from  the  truth." 

Who,  knowing  Butler's  nature,  does  not  picture  to  himself 
the  Mephistophelean  smile  which  ornamented  his  visage  as  he 
penned  the  above,  and  the  following  pretty  falsehood: 

"The  soldiers  of  the  United  States  are  here  especially  to 
see  that  there  is  no  interference  with  the  election." 

If  the  reader  cares  to  see  the  full  text  of  this  lying  order  he 
can  find  it  in  Butler's  book,  page  1097. 

On  Nov.  7th,  the  day  before  the  election,  after  Butler  had 
placed  his  troops  and  made  all  arrangements  necessary  to  con- 
trol the  ballot,  he  wrote  to  Secretary  of  War  Stanton  a  letter  in 
which  he  said : 

"I  beg  leave  to  report  that  the  troops  have  all  arrived, 
and  dispositions  made  which  will  insure  quiet.  I  enclose 
copy  of  my  order  No.  i,  and  trust  it  will  meet  your  approba- 
tion. I  have  done  all  I  could  to  prevent  secessionists  from 
voting,  and  think  it  will  have  some  etTect." 

Secessionists  meant  Democrats  who  chose  to  vote  for  Mc- 
Clellan. 

On  page  760  of  his  book  Butler  describes  how  he  disposed  of 
the  troops  to  accomplish  his  purpose.  On  page  771  Butler  gives 
a  joyful  account  of  a  reception  at  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel  tendered 


Ghap.  28  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  207 

him  in  honor  of  his  signal  success  in  keeping  Democrats  from 
voting.  Full  to  bursting  with  pride,  Butler  made  a  speech  to  his 
entertainers,  explaining  how.  after  the  Union  army  had  conquer- 
ed the  South,  her  people  should  be  treated. 

"Let  us,"'  said  this  willing  and  eager  tool  of  despotic 
power,  "take  counsel  from  the  Roman  method  of  carrying  on 
war." 

The  Roman  method  was  to  make  slaves  of  all  prisoners  of 
war ;  to  inflict  upon  them  every  cruelty  pagan  hearts  could  devise 
"Let  us,"  continued  Butler,  "say  to  our  young  men,  'look 
to  the  fair  fields  of  the  sunny  South  for  your  reward.  Go 
down  there  in  arms ;  you  shall  have  what  you  conquer,  in 
fair  division  of  the  lands,  each  man  in  pay  for  his  military 
service.  We  will  open  new  land  offices  wherever  our  army 
marches,  dividing  the  lands  of  the  rebels  among  our  sol- 
diers, to  be  theirs  and  their  heirs  forever.  Rebels  should  no 
longer  be  permitted  to  live  in  the  land  of  the  South,  or  any- 
where in  the  boundaries  of  the  United  States.  Let  them  go  to 
Mexico,  or  to  the  islands  of  the  sea,  or  to  a  place  I  do  not  like 
to  name.  I  know  of  no  land  bad  enough  to  be  cursed  with 
their  presence.     Never  should  they  live  here  again. 

This  pagan  speech  was  so  rapturously  received  by  Butler's 
audience,  the  Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher  (who  a  few  years  later 
was  tried  and  found  guilty  by  all  the  world  except  those  inter- 
ested in  whitewashing  him,  of  breaking  up  the  home  of  one  of 
his  parishioners  and  blasting  the  reputation  of  that  parishioner's 
wife),  made  a  speech  highly  lauding  Butler's  evil  work  and  pagan 
principles  and  naming  him  for  the  Presidencv  in  1868.  General 
Whitmore  followed  Beecher  in  the  same  strain  of  eulogy,  all  of 
which  filled  Butler  to  bursting  with  pride.  But  he  sorrowfully 
relates  that  these  high  laudations  proved  disastrous  to  all  the 
hopes  he  had  cherished  of  promotion  in  the  army.  These  fine 
compliments,  says  Butler,  and  the  grand  receptions  tendered — 

"Were  the  most  unhappy  and  unfortunate  occurrences  of 
my  life.  I  should  at  once  have  repudiated  the  honor  intend- 
ed. I  should  promptly  have  said :  'Gentlemen,  you  do  me  too 
much  honor.  General  Grant  ought  to  be  our  next  President 
after  Lincoln  retires.'  TJiat  would  have  taken  the  sting  out 
of  the  whole  affair.  I  could  then  have  been  put  in  command 
of  the  Army  of  the  Potomac,  if  I  wished." 

Butler  no  doubt  thought  his  service  in  New  York  in  keeping 
Democrats  from  voting  would  be  rewarded  by  promotion.  As  a 
salve  to  his  vanity  he  tries  to  have  it  appear  that  Grant's  jealousy 


2o8  Facts  and  F.\lsehoods.  Chap.     28 

interfered.     Butler's  vanity  was  immense.     It  shines  out  from 
ever}'  page  of  his  hook. 

In  the  year  1903.  in  the  cit>-  of  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  two  men  of  for- 
eigji  birth  and  from  the  lower  ranks  of  life  were  found  guilty  of 
having  procured  fraudulent  naturalization  papers  for  some  of 
their  countrymen  just  arrived  from  Italy.  These  two  men  were 
sentenced  to  serv^e  a  term  of  five  years  in  the  penitentiary.  The 
St.  Louis  Globe-Democrat,  a  stanch  Republican  journal,  in  an 
editorial  called  the  offense  of  which  these  two  m.en  were  found 
guilt}' — 

"A  horribly  atrocious  crime  against  the  ballot  box  and 
American  citizenship." 

Reader,  compare  the  magnitude  of  the  crime  these  two  men 
committed  in  1903  with  the  magnitude  of  the  crime  committed  in 
1864  by  the  President  of  the  United  States.  Is  not  the  one  as  a 
molehill  to  the  mountain  of  the  other?  Yet  the  criminals  of  1903 
were  condemned  to  wear  the  stripes  of  infamy  in  a  State  peni- 
tentiary- for  five  years.  The  criminal  of  1864  is  held  up  as  a 
model  for  American  youths  to  imitate. 

The  following  are  samples  of  telegraphic  orders  sent  by  Sew- 
ard and  Stanton  to  arrest  innocent  men : 

"Telegram.  Washington  City,  Sept.  14,  1861. 

"United  States  Marshal : 

"Arrest  Leonard  Sturtivant  and  send  him  to  Ft.  Lafay- 
ette, New  York.  Deliver  him  into  the  custody  of  Col.  ]Mar- 
tin  Burk. 

"W.  H    SEWARD." 

"Telegram. 

"War  Department.  Washington.   Oct.    19.    1861. 
"Richard  H.  Dana,  U.  S.  District  Attorney: 
"Send  Wm.  Pierce  to  Fort  Lafavette. 

"W.  H.  SEWARD." 

"Telegram.  "Washington,  Sept.  2,  1864. 

"United  States  Marshal: 

"John  W.  Watson  is  ;n  Boston,  No.  2  Olive  street.  He 
will  to-day  or  to-night  receive  goods  from  Lawrence.  New 
York,  probably  nautical  instruments,  care  of  Winer  &  Son. 
also  clothes  and  letters  from  St.  Denis  Hotel.  Watch  him. 
Look  out  for  the  clothes.  Seize  them.  Arrest  him  at  the 
right  time.  (The  right  time  was  in  the  dead  of  night.)  When 
he  is  arrested  don't  let  him  see  or  communicate  with  anyone. 


Chap.  29  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  209 

Bring  him  at  once  to  Washington.     The  letters  and  goods 
must  be  seized  by  all  means. 

"E.  M.  STANTON." 

In  Rhodes'  History  of  United  States,  page  468,  is  this  item : 

"The  New  York  World  and  Journal  of  Commerce  pub- 
lished, innocently,  a  forged  proclamation,  purporting  to  be 
Lincoln's.  As  soon  as  they  discovered  the  mistake  they 
made  adequate  and  apparently  satisfactor}-  explanations  to 
the  authorities,  but  President  Lincoln  ordered  the  editor  ar- 
rested and  imprisoned  and  the  paper  suppressed.  A  file  of 
soldiers  seized  the  officers  and  held  them  until  the  order  for 
arrest  was  rescinded." 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 

Mr.  Vallandinghani's  Case.  Unhappy  Conditions  of  Northern 
Democrats.  Lincoln's  Public  Declaration  of  Despotic  Doc- 
trines. 

In  1863  Mr.  Clement  L.  \'allandingham  was  the  Democratic 
nominee  for  Governor  of  the  State  of  Ohio.  Vallandingham  was 
an  eloquent  speaker  and  very  popular  in  his  own  party.  Being  a 
Democrat  he  naturally  opposed  despotism,  and  frequently  com- 
mented on  Lincoln's  illegal  arrests  and  imprisonments.  He  also 
censured  Lincoln  for  refusing  to  permit  the  South's  commis- 
sioners, Mr.  Holcomb  and  Mr.  Clement  C.  Qay,  to  enter  Wash- 
ington and  make  some  effort  to  end  the  war  by  diplomacy.  This 
greatly  irritated  Lincoln,  Seward  and  Stanton.  They  became 
eager  to  have  \'allandingham  arrested  and  cast  into  prison.  For 
some  time  the  people  had  been  greatly  agitated  and  alarmed 
about  illegal  arrests,  but  as  the  exercise  of  power  was  the  soul's 
delight  of  that  triumvirate  of  despots,  they  could  not  deny  them- 
selves such  pleasure.  General  Bumside  was  commander  of  a 
large  military  force  in  Southern  Ohio.  It  was  made  known  to 
him  that  the  President  would  be  much  pleased  if  \"allandingham 
was  put  where  his  voice  could  not  be  heard.  Of  course,  Bum- 
side  was  eager  to  please  the  President,  who  held  the  power  of 
promotion  and  dismissal  from  the  anriy.  A  mass  meeting  of 
Democrats  was  to  be  held  May  i,  1863,  at  Mount  Vernon,  Ohio. 
It  was  widely  advertised  that  Vallandingham  would  be  the  ora- 
tor of  the  day.  Bumside  sent  two  of  his  soldiers  in  citizen's 
clothes  to  hear  \'allandingham*s  speech,  and  to  bring  back  a  re- 
port on  which  he  could  be  arrested.     Of  course,  Bumside's  two 


2IO  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     29 

spies  got  what  they  were  sent  for.  That  night,  or  rather  the 
next  morning  at  half  past  two  o'clock,  one  hundred  armed  men 
stole  silently  along  the  deserted  streets  of  Dayton.  Ohio,  toward 
the  house  in  which  \^allandingham  lodged.  Armed  men  were 
deployed  around  the  house  to  stand  guard  at  every  exit.  Knock- 
ing on  the  front  door  with  the  butt  end  of  his  pistol,  the  captain 
of  the  company  demanded  admittance.  On  entering,  a  score  or 
more  men  tramped  through  halls  and  rooms  until  they  came  to 
\'allandingham's  bedchamber,  where  he  lay  fast  asleep.  "Get  up 
and  dress,"  ordered  the  captain  of  the  company,  shaking  the 
sleeping  man.  "What's  wanted?"  asked  A'allandingham,  start- 
ing up  and  rubbing  his  eyes.  "You!  Hurry!  We  take  the  next 
train  to  Cincinnati."  When  dressed,  one  soldier  seized  \^alland- 
ingham's  right  arm,  another  his  left,  and  hurried  him  down  to  the 
front  door,  where  a  carriage  waited.  He  was  rapidly  driven  to 
the  depot  and  soon  on  his  way  to  Cincinnati,  where  he  was  closely 
confined  until  May  6,  then  taken  before  a  military  court,  put 
through  the  farce  of  a  trial,  found  guilty  and  sent  to  Fort  War- 
ren, Boston  Harbor.  Arrests  of  this  arbitrary  nature  were  made 
every  day,  or  rather  every  night,  but  this  of  \'allandingham 
aroused  more  than  ordinary  indignation  and  alarm.  Mass  meet- 
ings were  held,  eloquent  speeches  made  in  Ohio,  New  York  and 
other  States.  In  the  history  of  the  long  and  woeful  contest  be- 
tween Despotism  and  Democracy  I  know  of  no  more  pitiable  con- 
dition to  which  the  latter  has  ever  been  reduced  than  that  in  which 
the  Democrats  of  the  North  found  themselves  under  the  rule 
of  the  Republican  party  in  the  60s.  Sympathizing  as  they  did 
with  the  South,  believing  as  they  did  that  her  cause  was  just,  hat- 
ing as  they  did  the  War  of  Conquest,  yet  feeling  themselves  un- 
able openly  to  oppose  and  fight  the  mighty  machinery  of  the  Re- 
publican Government,  during  all  the  four  years'  war  Democrats 
were  subject  to  the  insults,  scoffs,  gibes  and  taunts  of  Republi- 
cans. They  were  denounced  as  disloyal,  as  rebels,  as  traitors,  as 
copperheads.  They  were  liable  any  night  to  arrest  and  imprison- 
ment. Thousands  of  their  friends  and  relatives  languished  in 
jails,  and  many  died  there.  Some  Democrats,  hoping  to  escape 
persecution,  paid  a  haU-hearted  homage  to  Lincoln,  refrained 
from  criticism,  afifected  to  rejoice  at  Republican  successes  ;  but  no 
professions  of  loyalty  to  Lincoln  and  his  measures  saved  them 
from  the  scorn  and  contempt  of  the  Republican  party.  Too  well 
that  party  knew  it  was  not  possible  for  any  man  with  one  par- 
ticle of  Democracy  in  his  heart  to  believe  in  the  conquest  and 
subjugation  of  free  men,  free  States.     In  the  very  beginning  of 


Chap.  29  Facts   \xn  Falsf.tioods.  211 

the  war  the  Republican  rulers  had  cast  a  lasso  over  the  head  of 
Northern  Democracy  and  tied  it  fast  to  the  tail  end  of  the  great 
juggernaut  car.  which,  loaded  with  munitions  of  war,  was  sent 
crashing  over  the  Southern  States,  grinding  under  its  wheels 
every  living  thing  in  its  pathway.  Not  until  after  Lee's  sur- 
render and  after  Lincoln's  death  did  Xorthern  Democracy  shake 
from  its  neck  that  humiliating  thralldom. 

All  during  the  war  the  State  of  New  York  remained  Demo- 
cratic, yet  was  forced  to  render  its  full  quota  to  aid  a  war  it 
knew  was  iniquitous.  Nevertheless,  having  a  Democratic  Gov- 
ernor, the  people  of  New  York  felt  that  the  air  of  their  State 
was  somewhat  less  oppressive,  to  free  men,  than  in  some  other 
States.  Hence,  New  York  men  were  more  outspoken.  A  mass- 
meeting  was  held  in  Albany,  New  York,  to  discuss  the  Valland- 
ingham  outrage.  Eloquent  speeches  were  made  denouncing  Burn- 
side's  actions,  an  able  address  to  President  Lincoln  was  drawn 
up,  setting  forth  the  fact  that  Burnside  had  violated  the  iaw  of 
the  land ;  that  his  arrest  and  trial  of  a  civilian  in  a  military  court 
when  the  civil  courts  of  Ohio  were  in  full  and  unrestrained  opera- 
tion, was  an  outrage,  and  deserved  the  severest  reprehension,  and 
requested  Lincoln  to  rescind  Burnside's  order  to  imprison  Val- 
landingham,  release  him  from  military  custody  and  restore  him 
to  freedom.  The  Albany  address  and  Prei>ident  Lincoln's  reply 
thereto  being  too  lengthy  for  the  limits  of  this  work.  I  can  only 
give  a  few  extracts  from  Mr.  Lincoln's  written  reply  to  show  the 
<nen  of  this  age  with  what  cool,  self-complacent  conridence  the 
first  American  despot  propounded  the  Caesarian  doctrine  of  ab- 
solute rule.  Twenty  of  the  first  citizens  of  Albany  were  appointed 
to  go  to  Washington  and  present  the  address  to  the  President.  If 
the  reader  desires  to  see  the  address  and  Lincoln's  reply  he  can 
find  it  in  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History. 

In  reply  to  the  statement  that  the  citizens  of  Ohio  were 
amenable  to  the  laws  of  that  State,  and  if  charged  with  any  viola- 
tions of  law  Mr.  \'allandingham  should  have  been  tried  in  a  civil 
court,  President  Lincoln  wrote : 

"Civil  courts  are  organized  for  trials  on  charges  of  crime 

well  defined  by  law.    A  jury  of  the  civil  courts  too  frequently 

has  at  least  one  member  more  ready  to  hang  a  panel  than  to 

hang  the  traitor." 

Men  of  America !  consider  these  words  written  by  an  Ameri- 
can President.  Daniel  Webster  objected  to  military  courts  be- 
cause, as  he  said,  "military  courts  are  organized  to  convict."  The 
so-called  humane  Lincoln  objected  to  civil  courts  because  one 


212  Facts  and  Falsehoods,  Chap.     29 

member  of  the  jury  might  be  more  ready  to  hang  the  panel  than 
to  hang  the  man !  Lincoln  seems  to  assume  that  men  arrested  by 
military  officials  must  be  guilty,  therefore  should  have  no  chance 
of  escaping  conviction  by  trial  in  a  Civil  court.  Lincoln  also  ob- 
jects to  civil  courts  because  they  only  convict  on  charges  of  crime 
well  defined  by  law.  Military  courts  convict  on  the  most  frivolous 
pretexts,  or  no  pretext  at  all.  The  chief  thing  necessary  to  mili- 
tary conviction  is  that  some  man  in  high  place  should  desire  the 
man  to  be  convicted  and  put  out  of  his  way.  In  the  Albany  ad- 
dress reference  was  made  to  the  suspension  of  the  habeas  corpus. 
To  this  Mr.  Lincoln  replied  as  follows : 

"The  suspension  of  the  habeas  corpus  was  for  the  pur- 
pose that  men  may  be  arrested  and  held  in  prison  who  cannot 
be  proved  guilty  of  any  defined  crime  " 

Reflect  on  these  words,  O,  you  men  of  America !  You  who 
forget  that  "eternal  vigilance  is  the  price  of  liberty."  You  who, 
with  child-like  innocence,  rest  in  the  belief  that  the  future  has  no 
dangers  for  American  liberties.  But  even  the  above  declaration 
of  Lincoln's  is  not  the  worst. 

"Arrests,"  wrote  President  Lincoln  to  that  Albany  com- 
mittee of  Democrats,  "are  not  made  so  much  for  what  has 
been  done  as  for  what  possibly  might  be  done.  The  man 
who  stands  by  and  says  nothing  when  the  peril  of  his  Gov- 
ernment is  discussed  cannot  be  misunderstood.  If  not  hin- 
dered (by  arrest,  imprisonment,  or  death)  he  is  sure  to  help 
the  enemy." 

Is  it  any  wonder  under  rulings  like  this  that  38,000  arbitrary 
arrests  threw  38,000  innocent -men  and  women  into  American  bas- 
tiles  to  languish  for  months  or  years,  and  many  therein  to  die? 

Under  the  above  definition  of  treason  as  given  by  Lincoln, 
what  man  was  safe  ?  Is  it  any  wonder  a  reign  of  terror  existed  in 
the  Northern  States?  Under  Lincoln's  definition  silence  became 
an  act  of  treason.  A  man  with  a  sore  throat,  unable  to  talk  aloud, 
if  he  happened  to  be  present  when  the  Lincoln  Government  was 
discussed,  was  liable  to  arrest  and  imprisonment  in  the  most  dis- 
tant fortress  in  the  land.  Strange  as  this  may  appear  to  the 
people  of  this  age,  blackly  despotic  as  it  certainly  was,  there  was 
still  a  lower  deep  of  despotism,  and  President  Lincoln  fell  into 
that  lower  deep  and  dragged  down  with  him  the  last  shred  of 
freedom  left  to  the  people  of  the  Northern  States. 

"Much  more,"  wrote  the  President  of  the  United  States, 
"if  a  man  talks  ambiguously,  talks  with  'buts'  and  'ifs'  and 


Chap.  29  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  213 

*ands'  he  cannot  be  misunderstood.  If  not  hindered  (by  im- 
prisonment or  death)  this  man  will  actively  commit  treason. 
Arbitrary  arrests  are  not  made  for  the  treason  defined  in  the 
Constitution,  but  to  prevent  treason." 

That  is  to  prevent  the  sort  of  treason  never  before  known 
on  earth — the  treason  of  "ifs"  and  '"buts"  and  "ands" — the  trea- 
son made  and  invented  by  Abraham  Lincoln,  the  first  President  of 
the  Republican  party. 

In  "Recollections  of  the  War,"  page  236,  Charles  A.  Dana 
records  the  arbitrary  arrest,  by  order  of  President  Lincoln,  in  one 
day,  of  ninety-seven  of  the  leading  citizens  of  Baltimore,  and 
their  imprisonment,  mostly  in  solitary  confinement.  Not  one  of 
these  men  had  committed  or  was  charged  with  having  commit- 
ted any  offense  known  to  the  law  of  the  land.  Nor  is  there  the 
least  evidence  showing  that  any  one  of  the  ninety-seven  men  had 
used  the  "ifs"  and  "ands"  and  "buts"  so  offensive  to  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's sensitive  soul.  The  fear  that  thev  might  possibly  at  some 
future  time  mutter  or  speak  aloud  the  dangerous  "ifs"  and  "buts" 
and  "ands"  caused  the  arrest  and  imprisonment  of  the  ninety- 
seven  men  of  Baltimore.  In  the  darkest  days  of  President  Lin- 
coln's despotic  rule,  Governor  Seymour,  of  New  York,  had  the 
courage  to  condemn  and  denounce  that  rule.  In  a  speech  refer- 
ring to  arbitrary  arrests  and  imprisonments,  Seymour  said : 

"In  Great  Britain  the  humblest  hut  is  to  its  occupant  a 
castle  impregnable  to  the  monarch.  In  our  country  the  most 
unworthy  underling  of  power  is  licensed  to  break  within  the 
sacred  precincts  of  our  homes  and  drag  men  out  and  cast 
them  in  dungeon  cells." 

The  men  who  wielded  this  power  reveled  in  its  possession. 
Seward  is  the  man  who,  with  a  sardonic  smile,  said  to  Lord 
Lyons : 

"My  Lord,  I  can  touch  the  bell  at  my  right  and  order  the 
arrest  of  a  man  in  Ohio ;  I  can  again  touch  the  bell  and  order 
the  arrest  of  a  man  in  New  York,  and  no  power  on  earth  save 
that  of  the  President  can  release  them.  Can  the  Queen  of 
England  do  as  much  ?" 

"No,"  replied  the  astonished  Englishman.  "Were  she  to 
attempt  such  an  act  her  head  would  roll  from  her  shoul- 
ders." 

These  three  men — Lincoln,  Seward  and  Stanton — proudly 
boasted  that  they  held  more  power  over  the  people  of  America 


214  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     29 

than  any  monarch  since  the  reign  of  the  Stuarts  had  wielded 
over  the  Enghsh  people.  No  man  need  be  surprised  at  the  Re- 
publican party's  open  and  insolent  usurpation  of  power.  A  thou- 
sand times  had  the  speakers  of  that  party  publicly  declared  their 
contempt  and  hatred  of  the  Union,  of  the  Constitution,  of  the 
laws  of  the  land. 

The  New  York  Evening  Post  reported  that  the  great  Repub- 
lican preacher,  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  in  a  speech,  said  to  his  au- 
dience : 

"I  believe  that  Sharp's  rifle  is  a  truly  moral  agency. 
There  is  more  moral  power  in  one  of  these  instruments  than 
in  a  hundred  Bibles." 

It  was  also  reported  that  this  same  Beecher,  on  bidding  fare- 
well to  some  of  his  proteges  about  to  start  off  for  Kansas,  told 
them  that  to  shoot  at  a  Southern  man  and  miss  killing  him  would 
be  a  crime. 

Of  such  inestimable  value  to  liberty  did  Daniel  Webster  es- 
teem free  speech,  in  an  oration  he  said : 

"Free  speech  is  a  home-bred  right,  a  fireside  privilege. 
It  is  not  to  be  drawn  into  any  controversy.  It  is  as  undoubt- 
ed as  the  right  of  breathing  the  air  and  walking  the  earth. 
It  is  a  right  to  be  maintained  in  peace  and  in  war.  It  is  a 
right  which  cannot  be  invaded  without  destroying  constitu- 
tional liberty.  This  right  should  be  protected  and  guarded 
by  the  freemen  of  this  country  with  a  jealous  care  unless 
they  are  prepared  for  chains  and  anarchy." 

To  prevent  honorable  men  from  using  this  sacred  and  God- 
given  right  Abraham  Lincoln,  the  first  American  despot,  caused 
the  illegal  arrest  and  imprisonment  of  38,000  free  born  men  and 
women.     Thomas  Jefferson  said : 

"Those  to  whom  power  is  delegated  should  be  held  to  a 
strict  accountability  to  their  constitutional  oath  of  office.  The 
plea  of  necessity  is  no  excuse  for  a  violation  of  such  oath." 
The  "plea  of  necessity"  is  always  put   forward  to  excuse 
the  evil  deeds  of  despots.     Modern  Republican  writers  laud  Lin- 
coln's violation  of  law  and  affect  to  hold  him  as  a  god  above  all 
human  laws. 

Even  John  Adams,  Federal  though  he  was,  opposed  the  use 
of  arbitrary  power. 

"The  nature  of  encroachments  on  liberty  and  law,"  said 
Adams,  "is  to  grow  every  day  more  and  more  encroaching ; 
like  a  cancer,  it  eats  faster  and  faster  every  hour." 


Chap.  29  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  215 

Yet  modern  Republican  writers  admire  and  applaud  Lin- 
coln's encroachments.  The  conscience  of  the  conquering  party 
has  become  so  dulled,  its  reasoning  faculties  so  befogged,  its  love 
of  liberty  so  weak,  it  sees  no  danger  in  the  precedent  set  by  Mr. 
Lincoln.  Yet  that  party  well  knows  that  no  monarch  of  England 
since  the  reign  of  the  Tudors  has  dared  play  the  despot  as  Lin- 
coln did.  Charles  the  First  lost  his  head  and  James  the  Second 
his  throne  for  lesser  crimes  than  the  despot  of  the  6o's  was 
guilty  of. 

As  illustrative  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  peculiar  character  I  give  the 
following  story :  When  almost  in  despair  of  re-election  Lincoln 
wrote  General  McClellan  an  autograph  letter,  which  he  sent  by 
Mr.  Blair,  proposing  to  pay  him  (McClellan)  roundly  if  he  would 
withdraw  from  the  canvass  and  leave  the  field  clear  for  Lincoln's 
running.  The  compensation  Lincoln  offered  was  the  immediate 
appointment  of  McClellan  General  of  the  army,  and  the  appoint- 
ment of  McClellan's  father-in-law,  Mr.  Marcy,  Major  General, 
and  the  substantial  recognition  of  the  Democratic  party.  This 
was  a  brilliant  bait,  but  the  fish  did  not  bite.  General  McClellan 
promptly  refused.  The  story  of  the  afifair  is  related  in  Lamon's 
Recollections  of  Lincoln,  edited  by  his  daughter  Dorothy.  Mc- 
Clellan was  the  chosen  nominee  of  the  Democratic  party  at  that 
time ;  the  times  boded  success  to  Democracy.  Neither  Lincoln  or 
Lamon  seemed  to  perceive  the  baseness  involved  in  the  transac- 
tion which  Lincoln  proposed.  If  Lincoln  believed  that  McClellan 
was  the  best  man  to  be  at  the  head  of  th-o  army,  Avas  it  not  base  to 
make  his  appointment  a  matter  of  bargain  and  sale?  Was  not 
Lincoln's  ofifer  to  bribe  McClellan  to  betray  the  trust  his  own 
party  had  put  in  hftn  when  it  nominated  him  for  the  Presidency 
as  gross  an  insult  as  one  man  could  ofifer  another?  Instead  of 
seeing  this,  poor  Lamon  laments  that  General  McClellan  had  not 
the  patriotism  to  accept  Lincoln's  offer. 

Patriotism !  These  men  had  ceased  to  know,  if  they  ever  had 
known,  the  meaning  of  the  word.  To  them  it  no  longer  meant 
love  of  country.  It  only  meant  approbation  of  Lincoln's  war  of 
conquest  on  the  South.  Lamon  seems  to  have  thought  that  Lin 
coin  had  as  much  right  to  divide  the  power  he  wielded  over  thr 
country  as  he  had  to  divide  an  apple  he  was  eating ;  as  much  right 
to  bestow  one-half  of  the  power  he  had  usurped  as  he  would  have 
to  give  away  half  an  apple  he  had  bought.  Lamon  looked  on 
Lincoln's  ofifer  as  most  generous : 

"The    division,"    says    Lamon,    "of    the    Roman    world 
between  the  members  of  the  triumvirate  was  not  compara- 


2i6  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     29 

ble  to  the  proposal  of  Lincoln  to  McClellan,  because  the  Ro- 
man was  a  smaller  world  than  the  American,  and  it  (the 
Roman  world)  was  partitioned  among  three,  while  the  Amer- 
ican world  was  only  to  be  halved." 

Think  of  it,  gentle  reader!  Think  of  any  man  outside  of  a 
lunatic  asylum  fancying  he  had  the  right  to  look  upon  this  great 
country  as  his  to  divide  and  give  away  as  he  liked !  Poor  I.amon 
blamed  General  McClellan  for  not  accepting  "Lincoln's  generous 
offer."  Before  this  occurred,  Lincoln  had  tried  to  make  a  deal 
with  Governor  Seymour.     Lamon  tells  the  story  thus : 

"The  affairs  of  the  country  were  in  a  very  precarious 
condition,  and  were  daily  and  hourly  growing  worse,  and  time 
was  imperative.  Mr.  Lincoln  had  a  telegram  sent  from 
Washington  to  Governor  Seymour  requesting  him  to  come 
to  Washington  on  very  important  business.  Seymour  declin- 
ed, and  added  that  the  'distance  from  Washington  to 
Albany  was  precisely  the  same  as  from  Albany  to  Washing- 
ton.' Lincoln  then  sent  Thurlow  Weed  to  Albany  empower- 
ed to  make  Seymour  the  following  proposal : 

"  Tf  Governor  Seymour  will  withdraw  his  opposition  to 
the  draft,  and  use  his  authority  and  influence  as  Governor  in 
putting  down  the  riots  in  New  York,  and  will  co-operate  in 
all  reasonable  ways  with  the  administration  in  the  suppression 
of  the  Southern  rebellion,  President  Lincoln,  on  his  part, 
will  agree  fully  and  honestly  to  renounce  all  claims  to  the 
Presidency  for  the  second  term,  and  will  decline  under  any 
circumstances  to  be  a  candidate  for  re-election,  and  will  fur- 
ther agree  to  throw  his  entire  influence,  in 'so  far  as  he  can 
control  it,  in  behalf  of  Horatio  Seymour  for  President  of  the 
United  States.'" 

— Lamon's  Recollections  of  Lincoln,  page  213. 

Governor  Seymour  promptly  declined.  Was  Lincoln's  pro- 
posal a  trap  to  catch  Seymour?  Did  Seymour  remember  the 
nursery  rhyme : 

"Will  you  walk  into  my  parlor?"  said  the  spider  to  the  fly. 
"It's  the  prettiest  little  parlor  you  ever  did  spy." 

Did  Seymour  remember  Vallandingham's  case  ?  Vallanding- 
ham  had  been  arrested,  tried  and  condemned  for  far  less  offense 
to  President  Lincoln  than  Seymour  had  been  guilty  of.  Was  it 
to  arrest  and  silence  Seymour  that  he  was  invited  to  visit  Wash- 
ington?   At  any  rate  Seymour  was  too  prudent  to  be  caught  in  a 


Chap.  30  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  217 

trap  like  that ;  his  answer  to  Lincohi's  invitation,  that  "the  dis- 
tance to  and  from  Washington  to  Albany  was  precisely  the  same," 
shows  he  was  not  without  suspicion. 


CHAPTER  XXX. 

Was  the  War  Waged  to  Free  Slaves?  Lincoln  on  the  Negro. 
Van  Buren.  Lamon's  Testimony.  Wendell  Phillips.  Lin- 
coln's Letter  to  Greeley.  Sezvard's  Indifference.  Grant's 
Feeling.     Conway's  Evidence. 

Those  who  best  know  Mr.  Lincoln  assert  that  he  not  only 
was  indifferent  to  the  future  of  the  African  race,  but  disliked 
negroes  as  a  race,  and  had  little  or  no  faith  in  their  capability  of 
development.  At  no  period  of  his  life  was  he  in  favor  of  bestow- 
ing upon  them  political  or  social  equality  with  the  white  race. 
General  Don  Piatt,  a  fervent  Abolitionist,  sounded  Mr.  Lincoln 
on  this  question : 

"I  found,"  says  Piatt,  "that  Mr.  Lincoln  could  no  more 
feel  sympathy  for  that  wretched  race  than  he  could  for  the 
horse  he  worked  or  the  hog  he  killed.  Descended  from  the 
poor  whites  of  the  South,  he  inherited  the  contempt,  if  not  the 
hatred,  held  by  that  class  for  the  negro." 

In  his  Life  of  Lincoln,  page  236,  Lamon  says,  in  1846,  in  a 
speech,  Mr.  Lincoln — 

"Imputed  to  Van  Buren,  a  Democrat,  the  great  sin  of 
having  voted  in  the  New  York  State  Convention  for  negro 
suffrage  with  a  property  qualification.  Douglas  denied  the 
imputation,  but  Lincoln  proved  it  to  the  injury  of  Van  Bu- 
ren." 

On  page  334  of  Lamon's  Life  of  Lincoln    is  this: 

"None  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  public  acts,  either  before  or  after 
he  became  President,  exhibit  any  special  tenderness  for  the 
African  race,  or  commiseration  of  their  lot.  On  the  contrary 
he  invariably,  in  words  and  deeds,  postponed  the  interest  of 
the  negro  to  the  interest  of  the  whites.  When  from  political 
and  military  considerations  he  was  forced  to  declare  the  free- 
dom of  the  enemy's  slaves,  he  did  so  with  avowed  reluctance ; 
he  took  pains  to  have  it  known  he  was  in  no  wise  affected  by 
sentiment.  He  never  at  any  time  favored  the  admission  of 
negroes  into  the  body  of  the  electors  in  his  State,  or  in  the 
States  of  the  South.    He  claimed  that  those  negroes  set  free 


2i8  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     30 

by  the  army  were  poor  spirited,  lazy  and  slothful ;  that  they 
could  only  be  made  soldiers  by  force,  and  would  not  be  ever 
willing-  laborers  at  all ;  that  they  seemed  to  have  no  interest  in 
the  cause  of  their  own  race.,  but  were  as  docile  in  the  service 
of  the  rebellion  as  the  mule  that  ploughed  the  fields  or  drew 
the  baggage  trains.  As  a  people,  Lincoln  thought  negroes 
would  only  be  useful  to  those  who  were  at  the  same  time  their 
masters,  and  the  foes  of  those  who  sought  their  good.  He 
wanted  the  negro  protected  as  women  and  children  are.  He 
had  no  notion  of  extending  the  privilege  of  governing  to  the 
negro.  Lincoln  always  contended  that  the  cheapest  way  of 
getting  rid  of  the  neg-ro  was  for  the  Nation  to  buy  the  slaves 
and  send  them  out  of  the  country." 

General  Don  Piatt  says : 

"Lincoln  well  knew  that  the  North  was  not  fighting  to 
free  slaves,  nor  was  the  South  fighting  to  preserve  slavery. 
In  that  awful  conflict  slavery  went  to  pieces." 

Lincoln  himself  gives  testimony  on  this  slavery  question. 
Herndon  said  when  Lincoln  issued  the  emancipation  proclama- 
tion there  was  no  heart  in  it.  Every  one  remembers  Lincoln's 
letter  to  Greeley,  in  which  he  frankly  declared  that  whatever  he 
did  for  or  with  negroes,  he  did  to  help  him  save  the  Union  ;  that 
is,  to  conquer  the  South. 

"My  paramount  object,"  wrote  Lincoln  to  Greeley,  "is  to 
save  the  L^nion,  and  not  either  destroy  or  save  slavery.  If  1 
could  save  the  Union  without  freeing  the  slaves,  I  would  do 
it.  If  I  could  save  the  L'nion  by  freeing  some  and  leaving 
others  in  slavery,  I  would  do  it.  If  I  could  save  it  by  freeing 
all,  I  would  do  that.  What  I  do  about  slavery  and  the  color- 
ed race,  I  do  because  I  believe  it  helps  to  save  the  Union." 

Yet  this  man  had  been  put  in  office  by  a  party  which  hated 
and  despised  the  LT^nion.     On  another  occasion  Lincoln  wrote: 

"I  have  no  purpose  to  introduce  political  or  social  equal- 
ity between  the  white  and  black  race.  There  is  a  phys- 
ical difference  between  the  two  which  probably  will  forever 
forbid  their  living  together  on  the  same  footing  of  equality. 
I,  as  well  as  any  other  man,  am  in  favor  of  the  race  to  which 
I  belong  having  the  superior  position.  I  have  never  said  any- 
thing to  the  contrary." 

Simon  Cameron.  Lincoln's  first  Secretary  of  War,  wrote 
General  Butler,  then  in  New  Orleans : 


Chap.  30  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  219 

"President  Lincoln  desires  the  right  to  hold  slaves  to  be 
fully  recognized.  The  war  is  prosecuted  for  the  Union,  hence 
no  question  concerning  slavery  will  arise." 

In  his  inauguration  Lincolri  said: 

"I  have  no  lawful  right  to  interfere  with  slavery  directly 
or  indirectly;  I  have  no  inclination  to  do  so." 

Mr.  Wendell  Phillips  said  that  Lincoln  was  badgered  into 
issuing  the  emancipation  proclamation,  and  that  after  it  was 
issued,  Lincoln  said  it  was  the  greatest  folly  of  his  life.  That 
much  lauded  instrument  speaks  for  itself.  It  plainly  proves  that 
its  writer  had  not  the  least  heart  in  the  business  of  freeing  slaves. 
Had  he  taken  any  joy  in  the  work,  would  he  have  bestowed  the 
boon  of  freedom  only  on  those  negroes  still  under  the  rule  of  the 
Confederacy,  leaving  the  large  number  in  those  States  and  parts 
of  States  under  his  own  control  in  the  bondage  they  were  born  in  ? 

When  General  Grant  was  Colonel  of  the  Twenty-first  Illi- 
nois Infantry  he  expressed  himself  plainly  on  the  negro  question : 

"The  sole  object  of  this  war,"  said  Grant,  "is  to  restore 
the  Union.  Should  I  become  convinced  it  has  any  other  ob- 
ject, or  that  the  Government  designs  using  its  soldiers  to  exe- 
cute the  wishes  of  the  Abolitionists,  I  pledge  you  my  honor 
as  a  man  and  a  soldier  I  would  resign  my  commission  and 
carry  my  sword  to  the  other  side." 

— Democratic  Speaker's  Handbook,  p.  33. 
On  May  29,  1863,  Mr.   F.  A.  Conway,  Congressman  from 
Kansas,  wrote  to  the  New  York  Tribune,  as  follows: 

"The  independence  of  the  South  is  now  an  established 
fact.  The  war  for  the  future  becomes  simply  an  instrument 
in  the  hands  of  the  political  managers  to  effect  results  to  their 
own  personal  ends  unfavorable  to  the  cause  of  freedom.  It  is 
now  assumed  that  the  Union  is  the  object  paramount  over 
every  other  consideration.  Every  institution  is  now  of  small 
importance.  Slavery  must  give  way,  or  not  give  way ;  must 
be  strangled,  or  given  new  lease  of  life  with  increased  power, 
just  as  the  exigencies  of  the  North  may  require.  This  has 
now  become  the  doctrine  of  life-long  Abolitionists.  Gerritt 
Smith,  Raymond  and  other  men  want  power  and  care  for 
nothing  else.  For  tJie  sake  of  pozver  they  zvould  kill  all  the 
white  people  in  the  South,  or  take  than  to  their  arms.  They 
would  free  all  the  slaves  or  make  their  bondage  still  more 
helpless;  they  ivoidd  do  anything  wicked  for  the  sake  of 
power." 


220  Facts  and  Falsehoods.        '       Chap.     31 

Never  were  truer  words  spoken  or  written  than  these  by  that 
zealous  Abolition  Congressman  Conway  of  Kansas.  In  Hern- 
don's  suppressed  Life  of  Lincoln,  he  said : 

"When  Lincoln  issued  the  proclamation  to  free  the  slaves 
there  was  no  heart  in  the  act." 

One  of  the  boldest  Republican  organs,  in  1880,  the  Lemars 
(Iowa)  Sentinel,  frankly  betrays  its  party's  real  feeling  toward 
the  negro  race,  as  follows : 

"As  an  ofHce  seeker,  the  negro  has  more  brass  in  a  square 
inch  of  his  face,  more  rapaciousness  for  office,  than  his 
barbarian  masters  ever  dared  to  possess.  The  Southern  brig- 
adier wants  office  and  place,  but  he  is  willing  to  fight  for 
fhem,  or  vote  for  them;  at  the  drop  of  the  hat  he  will  shoot 
and  cut  for  them ;  he  does  not  whine  like  a  whipped  cur,  or 
demand  like  a  beggar  on  horseback,  as  the  nigger  does.  Let 
the  nigger  first  learn  to  vote  before  he  asks  for  ofifice.  The 
brazen- jawed  nigger  is  but  a  trifle  less  assuming,  insolent  and 
imperious  in  his  demands  than  the  lantern-jawed  brigadiers ; 
the  educated  nigger  is  a  more  capacious  liar  than  his  barba- 
rian masters  ez'er  were,  or  dared  to  be 

"The  greatest  mistake  the  Republican  party  ever  made 
was  taking  the  nigger  at  a  single  bound  and  placing  on  his 
impenetrable  skull  the  crown  of  suffrage.  It  is  a  wrong  to 
him  and  to  us  to  let  him  wield  the  ballot.  The  nigger  is  nec- 
essarily an  ignoramus.  The  free  nigger,  we  repeat,  is  a 
fraud." 


CHAPTER  XXXI. 

The  Reconstruction  Period — Hate  and  Cruelty. 

The  full  horrors  of  this  dreadful  period  have  never  been  por- 
trayed. God  knows  the  South  was  hated  enough  before  and  dur- 
ing the  war,  but  after  the  conquest,  as  she  lay  disarmed  at  the 
feet  of  her  conquerors,  wounded  almost  unto  death,  the  vengeful 
ferocity  of  Republicans  was  something  to  wonder  at.  The 
events  of  that  period  deserve  a  volume  to  themselves.  I  shall  only 
say  a  few  words  on  the  subject,  Wendell  Phillips,  insane  hater 
of  the  South  though  he  was,  sometimes  had  the  honesty  to  speak 
plainly  of  his  own  party.     Witness  the  following: 

"The  Republican  party,"  said  Phillips,  "is  not  inspired 
with  any  humane  desire  to  protect  the  negro.     It  uses  the 


Chap.  31  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  221 

bloody  shirt  for  office,  and  once  there,  only  laughs  at  it.  Today 
our  greatest  danger  is  the  Republican  party.  Wolves  in 
sheep's  clothing !  Hypocrites !  I  hail  their  coming  defeat, 
looking  forward  to  it  as  the  dawning  of  a  glorious  day." 

From  early  manhood  General  Grant  was  afflicted  with  the 
drink  disease.     Phillips  said : 

"Grant  can  never  stand  before  a  bottle  of  whiskey  with- 
out falling  down." 

General  Piatt,  in  "Memories  of  the  Men  Who  Saved  the 
Union,"  says: 

"Grant's  habit  of  drink  lost  us  thousands  and  thousands 
of  patriotic  lives.  The  attempt  to  conceal  this  is  not  only 
pitiable,  but  hopeless." 

The  terrible  slaughter  of  Union  soldiers  at  Cold  Harbor  was 
charged  to  Grant's  drunkenness.  Major-General  Wm.  F.  Smith, 
in  a  confidential  letter  to  Senator  Foote,  July  30,  1864,  states  that 
soon  after  Grant  had  taken  a  pledge  to  drink  nothing  intoxicating, 
he  (Grant)  called  at  his  (Smith's)  headquarters,  and  asked  for 
whiskey,  and  drank  so  often  he  went  away  drunk,  aiid  General 
Butler  sazv  him.  A  short  while  before  this  Grant  had  written  to 
Washington  asking  that  General  P>utler  be  relieved  from  that  de- 
partment, because  he  (Grant)  "could  not  trust  Butler  zuith  the 
command  of  the  troops  in  the  movements  about  to  he  made."  In- 
structions were  sent  to  Grant  to  remove  Butler.  Butler  heard  of 
this  and  hurried  to  see  Grant.  General  Smith  wrote  Senator  Foote 
that  he  heard  direct  from  Grant's  headquarters,  and  also  from 
another  source,  that  General  Butler  threatened  Grant  that  he 
would  expose  his  drunken  habits  if  the  order  was  not  revoked. 
The  order  zvas  revoked,  and  Butler  remained  in  command,  al- 
though Grant  had  said  he  was  unfit  to  be  trusted. 

General  Piatt  says : 

"Grant  has  his  monument  in  the  hearts  of  Republicans ; 
for  that  he  lent  his  name  to  secure  the  perpetuation  of  Repub- 
lican power." 

Grant  did  not  lend  his  name  to  secure  the  perpetuation  of  Re- 
publican power,  but  to  secure  the  Presidency  for  himself.  When 
Grant  came  to  believe  that  the  Republicans  who  opposed  Johnson 
and  his  policy  would  succeed  in  deposing  Johnson^  he  abandoned 
Johnson  and  his  policy  (the  very  policy  he  himself  had  recom- 
mended to  Johnson),  rushed  into  the  camp  of  Johnson's  bitter 
foes,  and  became  the  tool  and  agent  of  the  Republican  leaders  to 


222  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     31 

carry  out  their  cruel  policy  toward  the  people  of  the  South. 
General  Piatt  testifies  concerning  Grant   thus : 

"Secretary  Stanton  had  no  hesitation  in  expressing  his 
contempt  for  Grant — contempt  caused  by  the  following  event : 
When  the  army  of  the  Cumberland  was  cooped  up  in  Chatta- 
nooga, with  starvation  or  surrender  staring  them  in  the  face, 
Stanton  hurried  to  meet  Grant  at  Louisville  and  consult  with 
him  as  to  the  best  means  of  relieving  our  forces.  The  day 
on  which  the  two  men  met  was  given  to  these  considerations, 
and  the  wire  between  Chattanooga  and  Louisville  trembled 
with  continuous  messages.  When  night  came  the  two  men 
separated  with  the  understanding  that  after  an  hour's  rest  and 
refreshment  they  should  again  meet  and  continue  their  labor. 
Grant  was  to  leave  next  morning  for  Chattanooga.  When  the 
time  came  for  the  meeting  Grant  did  not  appear.  Stanton 
waited  impatiently,  receiving  the  telegrams  that  continued  to 
pour  in,  and  at  last  sent  for  Grant,  who  could  not  be  found. 
Annoyed  and  disgusted,  Stanton  had  the  theatres  searched 
without  success.  At  last,  long  after  midnight.  General  Grant 
was  found  i>i  a  place  and  binder  such  circwnstances  not  neces- 
sary to  relate  to  those  who  kneiv  his  habits.  Had  Grant  been 
of  a  sensitive  nature,  under  Stanton's  savage  reprimand,  he 
would  have  then  and  there  disappeared  from  history." 

Grant  came  near  being  arrested  by  Halleck  more  than  once. 
In  a  telegram  to  McClellan,  Halleck  said : 

"A  rumor  has  reached  me  that  Grant  has  resumed  his 
former  bad  habits.  If  so  it  will  account  for  his  oft  repeated 
neglect  of  my  oft  repeated  orders.  I  do  not  deem  it  advisable 
to  arrest  him  at  present." 

In  a  telegram  to  Grant,  Halleck  said : 

"Your  neglect  of  repeated  orders  has  caused  great  dissat- 
isfaction and  seriously  interfered  with  military  plans.  Your 
going  to  Nashville  without  authority,  and  when  your  presence 
•  with  your  troops  was  of  the  greatest  importance,  was  a  mat- 
ter of  serious  complaint  at  Washington,  so  much  so  that  I 
was  advised  to  arrest  you  on  your  return." 

Yet  to  this  alcohol-soaked  man — this  man  who  could  not  see 
a  bottle  of  whiskey  without  falling  down — a  Republican  Congress 
gave  absolute  power  over  the  Southern  States.  There  was  no  es- 
cape from  any  decree  issued  from  Grant's  whiskey-soaked  brain. 
He  had  power  to  delegate  his  rule  to  any  man  under  him.  Grant 
said  to  the  military  commanders  under  him: 


Chap.  31  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  223 

"The  law  makes  the  district  commanders  their  own  in- 
terpreters of  their  power  under  it." 

This  drunken  despot  wielded  absolute  and  irresponsible  pcnv- 
er  over  the  unarmed  people  of  the  South.  A  few  samples  of  the 
methods  Grant's  sub-despots  used  will  illustrate  the  South 's 
condition : 

"Headquarters  Fourth  Military  District  of  Mississippi. 

"Vicksburi^,  Miss.,  June  15,  1868. 
"General  Order  No.  123. 
"First. — Major-Gen.  Adelbert  Ames  is  appointed  Gov- 
ernor of  the  State  of  Mississippi,  vice  Benjamin  G.  Hum- 
phreys, hereby  removed. 

"Second. — Captain  Jasper  Myers  is  appointed  Attorney 
General  of  the  State  of  Mississippi,  vice  C.  Hooker,  hereby 
removed. 

"Third.— The:  officers  appointed  j^bove  will  repair  with- 
out delay  to  Jackson,  and  enter  immediately  upon  the  duties 
of  their  respective  offices." 

"Headquarters   Third   Military    District,    Georgia,   Alabama 
and  Florida. 

"Atlanta,  Ga.,  January  13,   1868. 
"Charles  J.  Jenkins,  Milledgeville,  Ga. 

"Sir : — I  have  no  alternative  but  to  remove  you  from 
your  office,  as  you  will  see  by  the  enclosed  order.  I  do  not 
deem  myself  called  upon  to  answer  the  arguments  in  your 
letter. 

"GEORGE  MEADE,  Major-General  Commanding.'' 

No  despot  ever  felt  called  upon  to  answer  arguments.  Force 
is  the  only  argument  despots  use  or  can  understand.  Mr.  John 
Imes  was  the  Treasurer  of  Georgia.    Meade  wrote  him  as  follows : 

"Mr.  John  Imes: 

"Sir: — I  am  compelled  to  remove  you  from  office,  as  you 
will  see   I  have  done  by  the  enclosed  order. 

"GEORGE  MEADE,  Major-General   Commanding." 

Grant's  sub-despot  over  South   Carolina  wrote  as   follows : 

"Headquarters. 

"Charleston,  S.  C,  Oct.    16,   1867. 
"Judge  Aldrich  has  been  suspended,  and  will  not  be  per- 
mitted to  hold  any  court  in  his  circuit.     See  special  Order  No. 
183,  of  this  date.     Bv  command  of 

"BREVET  MAJOR  GENERAL  ^E.  R.  C  CANBY." 


224  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     31 

Does  the  reader  want  to  know  how  the  sub-despots  appointed 
by  Grant  ruled  the  people  of  the  South?  To  this  day  that  rule 
is  referred  to  as  the  "horrors  of  the  reconstruction  period." 
After  the  military  had  full  possession  of  all  the  offices  of  the 
civil  courts,  from  the  highest  down,  malignant  bullies 
everywhere  in  power,  a  reign  of  terror  set  in  almost 
equal  to  the  awful  days  of  the  French  Revolution.  Ev- 
ery day  numbers  of  the  best  citizens  arrested  on  the 
most  frivolous  charges,  or  no  charge  whatever,  hands 
and  feet  fettered  as  felons,  dragged  hundreds  of  miles  away  from 
homes  and  friends,  were  thrown  into  dungeon  cells,  in  which  they 
lay  months  or  years  in  solitary  confinement  unless  death  ended 
their  suffering.  These  prisoners  were  not  permitted  to  see 
friends,  relatives  or  counselor-at-law.  During  their  long  impris- 
onment, miserably  fed,  cursed,  abused  by  jailers,  tried  by  military 
commissioners,  many  died,  many  were  condemned  and  sentenced 
for  life  to  the  Dry  Tortugas — condemned  on  evidence  no  court  of 
justice  would  have  received.  It  was  noticed  that  the  military 
courts  seemed  to  feel  special  antipathy  to  young  men,  to  beardless 
boys — sons  of  the  best  citizens.  The  suffering  of  these  youths  in 
prison,  their  tortures  in  the  Dry  Tortugas,  they  knew  would  in- 
flict the  keenest  anguish  on  the  hearts  of  parents  and  relatives. 
The  Montgomery  (Ala.)  Mail,  speaking  of  the  large  number  of 
innocent  young  men  sent  to  the  Dry  Tortugas,  thus  describes  that 
place  of  torment: 

"At  the  Dry  Tortugas  the  prisoners'  heads  are  shaved. 
They  have  to  labor  under  a  torrid  sun  upon  a  sand  bank  in 
the  midst  of  the  ocean,  with  balls  and  chains  about  their  legs. 
The  men  who  command  the  prisoners  are  amenable  to  the 
laws  of  neither  God  or  man.  Col.  Grental,  a  soldier,  was  tied 
up  by  his  thumbs,  and  treated  with  every  species  of  cruelty 
and  barbarity.  The  laws  are  silent  and  newspapers  dumb. 
The  prisoner  who  enters  the  Dry  Tortugas  leaves  liberty, 
justice,  hope,  behind  him.  Large  numbers  of  young  South- 
ern men,  for  any  or  no  offense,  in  what  is  called  the  recon- 
struction period,  are  arrested,  go  t'rov.gh  the  farce  of  a 
drumhead  trial,  presided  over  by  men  who  take  a  fiendish  de- 
light in  torturing  any  Southern  man  or  woman,  nearly  always 
found  guilty,  and  sentenced  for  life  to  the  Dry  Tortugas  The 
lips  of  the  Alabama  journals  are  pinned  together  with  bayo- 
nets. Our  hands  are  fastened  in  iron  cuffs.  We  dare  not 
speak  the  whole  truth.     If  we  did  our  paper  would  be  sup- 


Chap.  31  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  225 

pressed,  our  business  ruined,  our  wives  and  children  brought 
to  want." 

Neither  the  despot  Grant  nor  his  sub-despots  ever  forgot  the 
press.  Every  officer  and  private  in  that  army  of  despotism  kept 
a  sharp  eye  on  newspapers,  and  were  quick  to  apply  the  muzzle 
if  any  paper  dared  make  public  their  evil  deeds.  Despotism  is  a 
noxious  plant,  which  hates  the  light  and  flourishes  only  in  dark 
places.  A  few  samples  will  show  how  despots  muzzled  the  press 
in  the  South:  On  November  15,  1867,  a  file  of  soldiers  entered 
the  ofiice  of  the  Vicksburg  Times,  arrested  the  editor,  dragged 
him  to  jail.  McArdle's  offense  was  having  reported  in  the  paper 
a  despotic  order  made  by  General  Ord,  and  comparing  the  situa- 
tion of  the  South  with  that  of  Poland.  McArdle  was  tried  by  a 
military  commission  (always  organized  to  convict)  and  condemn- 
ed. Being  a  man  of  talent  he  took  an  appeal,  but  all  the  influence 
of  the  military  was  against  him.  The  case  dragged  on  for  years 
before  a  final  decision,  which  I  have  failed  to  find. 

Early  on  the  morning  of  August  8,  1867,  a  body  of  soldiers 
forced  their  way  into  the  oflice  of  the  Constitutional  Eagle,  pub- 
lished at  Camden,  Ark.,  seized,  carried  off  and  destroyed  all  the 
material  of  the  office.  Col.  C.  C.  Gilbert,  the  small  despot  com- 
manding the  Union  soldiers  at  Camden,  justified  the  acts  of  his 
men,  saying  to  the  editor : 

"An  article  in  your  paper  unnecessarily  exasperated  my 
soldiers.  The  press  may  censure  the  servants  of  the  people, 
but  the  military  are  not  the  servants  of  the  people,  but  their 
masters.  It  is  a  great  impertinence  for  a  newspaper  in  this 
State  to  comment  on  the  military  under  any  circumstances." 
— The  Democratic  Speaker  and  Handbook. 

The  comment  which  unnecessarily  exasperated  the  soldiers 
was  a  statement  that  when  drunk  the  soldiers  were  in  the  habit 
of  indecently  exposing  their  persons  on  the  street  when  ladies 
were  passing.  The  National  Intelligencer  of  Washington  City 
commented  on  the  rule  of  the  military  satraps  in  the  South,  as 
follows : 

"Without  any  proof  whatever  four  respectable  citizens 
were  arrested  and  confined  in  separate  cells  in  Atlanta,  denied 
all  communication  with  friends,  save  under  military  surveil- 
lance, denied  all  opportunity  to  confer  with  legal  counsel. 
Two  white  men  in  Fort  Pulaski  were  confined  in  cells  and  de- 
nied all  access  to  friends  or  legal  counsel.  These  six  men 
were  brought  out  of  their  dungeons,  hurried  to  trial  for  their 


226  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     31 

lives  before  a  military  commission,  one  of  those  institutions, 
Mr.  Webster  said,  always  organized  to  convict.  The  statement 
of  facts  is  sufficiently  horrible  and  damnable  to  every 
officer  and  agent  concerned  in  it.  But  this  is  only  a  part  of 
the  infamous  record.  While  these  men  are  immured  in  dun- 
geons, cut  off  from  all  access  to  friends  or  counsel,  their  ene- 
mies, with  artful  and  incessant  malice,  have  been  busy  in  pro- 
curing false  testimony,  and  the  uniform  of  the  nation  is  de- 
graded by  the  military  arrest  of  ignorant  negroes,  dragging 
them  by  force  before  a  military  board,  and  then  by  threats 
and  curses,  starvation  and  solitary  confinement,  endeavor  to 
extort  from  them  false  testimony  upon  which  the  lives  of 
innocent  men  may  be  taken  away.  The  testimony  we  pub- 
lish to-day  establishes  these  facts,  and  shows  the  charac- 
ter of  the  government  under  which  the  people  of  the  South 
now  live." — Democratic  Handbook  and  Speaker,  page   162. 

These  military  lords  permitted  the  farce  of  elections,  if  car- 
ried on  under  military  control.  Armed  battalions  of  negroes  and 
Federal  white  men  surrounded  the  voting  places.  In  vain  Demo- 
crats issued  protests  against  these  outrages.  In  the  House  of  Con- 
gress Mr.  Brooks,  in  behalf  of  the  Democratic  members,  offered 
a  powerful  protest. 

"The  military,"  said  the  protest,  "have  been  used  to  de- 
stroy States.  The  General  of  the  army  (Grant),  representing 
the  sword,  and  only  the  sword  (he  represented  a  whiskey  bot- 
tle also),  has  been  exalted  by  acts  of  Congress  above  the 
constitutional  Commander  in  Chief  (the  President)  of  the 
Army  and  Navy,  in  order  to  execute  these  military  decrees 
and  root  out  every  vestige  of  constitutional  law  and  libert}'. 
To  prolong  and  perpetuate  this  military  rule  in  the  North  and 
West,  as  well  as  the  South,  this  same  General  of  the  army 
(Grant)  has  been  elected  at  the  Chicago  Convention  to  head 
the  electoral  votes  for  the  Presidency  in  ten  States  of  this 
Union,  which  are  as  much  under  his  feet  as  Turkey  is  under 
the  Sultan's,  or  Poland  under  the  Czar  of  Russia." 

If  the  protests  from  Northern  Democrats  did  not  stem  the 
tide  of  despotism,  they  at  least  showed  that  a  spark  of  the  old 
fire  of  liberty  yet  existed  in  this  corrupted  Union.  At  one  stroke 
of  the  pen  Sheridan,  Grant's  sub-despot,  disfranchised  thirty 
thousand  white  men  in  Louisiana.  Grant  was  responsible  for 
every  criminal  act  done  by  the  military.  The  New  York  Herald 
said  of  Grant's  brutality  in  the  South: 


Chap.  31  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  227 

"Every  personal  right  of  the  citizen  is  invaded  at  once. 
Without  any  process  of  law  whatever,  a  man  is  deprived 
of  his  liberty  and  thrust  into  a  cell  at  the  mere  biddinj:^  of  a 
political  or  military  bully.  The  secrecy  of  the  telegraph  and 
post  office  is  violated  as  no  man  would  dare  violate  them  in 
despotic  France." 

At  that  time  France  was  ruled  by  an  Emperor.  The  South 
was  ruled  by  the  despotism  of  hate.  No  Christian  Emperor, 
King  or  Kaiser  was  ever  so  cruel,  so  bitter,  so  vindictive  as  the 
hate  despotism  imposed  by  Grant  upon  the  people  of  the  South. 
By  bogus  elections  carpetbaggers  went  to  Congress.  It  seemed 
that  the  chief  aim  of  these  bogus  Congressmen  was  to  obtain  ad- 
ditional power  to  rob,  oppress  and  torment  the  people  of  the 
South.  The  excuse  for  seeking  Congressional  aid  was  the  ready 
lie  that  the  people  of  the  South  were  on  the  eve  of  another  re- 
bellion. On  the  23d  of  July  a  bill  to  send  more  soldiers  and  mu- 
nitions of  war  to  the  Southern  States  was  up  for  discussion.  A 
man  by  the  name  of  Stokes,  who  claimed  to  represent  a  Tennessee 
Congressional   district,   spoke   as   follows: 

"If  you  do  not  send  us  guns  and  powder  and  bayonets 
and  cannon,  and  send  'em  quick,  Forrest  and  his  rebel  crew  of 
Democrats  will  be  down  on  us  like — like  a  thousand  devils! 
I  want  ten  thousand  stand  of  arms  for  my  own  district.  Un- 
less you  send  on  these  arms  all  the  truly  loyal  negroes  will  be 
overrun  and  the  Republican  party  killed  in  Tennessee." 

Mr.  Washburn,  of  Illinois,  seemed  to  be  very  anxious  to  send 
guns  and  bayonets  down  to  the  loyal  negroes  and  carpetbaggers, 
but  he  was  afraid. 

"Sir,"  said  Mr.  Washburn,  "sir,  I  believe  that  in  most 
of  the  States  not  ten  days  after  these  arms  are  sent  South  to 
the  loyal  negroes  they  will  be  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels." 

Congress  saw  the  danger.  Never  before  was  any  Congress  in 
so  painful  a  quandary.  Anxious,  yet  afraid,  to  arm  loyal  negroes 
and  carpetbaggers.  A  man  named  Dewees,  claiming  to  represent 
the  people  of  North  Carolina  (he  might  as  well  have  claimed  to 
represent  the  people  in  the  moon  or  the  farthest  star),  added  to 
the  distress  and  perplexity  of  Congress. 

"If  you  don't  give  us  arms,"  cried  Mr.  Dewees,  pale  and 
anxious,  "before  six  months  the  Ku-Klux-Klan.  the  Rebels 
and  the  Copperheads  will  be  ruling  the  whole  South." 

Ku-Klux,  Rebels  and  Copperheads  were  a  trinity  of  devils. 
Hades  had  no  worse.     Still,  Congress  was  afraid  to  send  to  th* 


228  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

loyal  negroes  and  carpetbaggers  munitions  of  war,  which  seems  a 
little  strange  to  us  of  this  generation,  knowing,  as  all  now  know, 
that  the  Ku-Klux  or  Rebels  in  the  South  had  no  arms  or  muni- 
tions of  war,  while  the  loyal  negroes  and  carpetbaggers  were 
well  armed.  A  Democrat  named  Woodward  ventured  to  ask  if 
the  reconstruction  government  in  the  South  could  be  maintained 
in  no  other  way  than  by  the  bayonet.  This  question  aroused  Mr. 
Dewees'  indignation. 

"No!"  he  roared.  "We  can  only  sustain  our  Govern- 
ment by  arms !  Arms  we  must  have,  or  Ku-Klux,  Rebels 
and  Copperheads  will  wipe  us  out  and  rule  the  South." 

At  this  one  or  two  Copperheads  (Northern  Democrats)  were 
imprudent  enough  to  laugh,  which  had  the  effect  of  stirring  Mr. 
Dewees  up  to  the  very  highest  flight  of  oratory.    Mr.  Dewees  was 
short,  thick  set,  and  very  ruddy,  so  to  speak ;  every  pore  of  his 
body  broke  out  into  a  glow  and  gush  and  roar  of  eloquence,  and 
the  whole  House  on  both  sides  became  convulsed  with  laughter. 
"Come  on!"  shouted  the  man    claiming    to    represent 
North  Carolina ;  "I  say,  come  on  when  you  feel  disposed ! 
Stretch  out  your  traitorous  hands  to  touch  again  one  fold  of 
the  old  flag,  and  representatives  of  four  million  of  men  with 
black  skins,  but  loyal  hearts,  will  dash  themselves  a  bulwark 
between  you  and  the  loyal  governments  in  the  South,  and 
you  will  only  live  in  sad  memories  of  bad  events.    Come  on ! 
Come  on!" 

No  one  seemed  disposed  to  come  on,  though  entreated  so 
fervently.  Never  before  was  Congress  in  such  a  higgledy-pig- 
gledy state  of  mind.  If  they  sent  arms  to  negroes  and  carpetbag- 
gers the  rebels  would  get  every  gun  within  ten  days.  Mr.  Wash- 
burn said  so.  If  they  didn't  send  arms  the  rebels  would  get  every 
negro  and  carpetbagger  in  ten  days.     Mr.  Dewees  said  so. 

CHAPTER  XXXII. 

Hate. 
"Forgiveness  to  the  injured  does  belong; 
But  they  ne'er  pardon,  who  have  done  the  wrong." 

On  reading  over  the  preceding  pages  of  this  work,  I  find  the 
word  hate  often  recurs.  In  the  absence  of  evidence  the  men  of 
this  generation  will  not  be  able  to  form  any  adequate  conception  of 
the  vast  volume  of  virulence  which,  like  an  empoisoned  stream 
bubbling  up  from  hell  itself,  continually  flowed  downward  on  the 
people  of  the  South.    This  stream  was  started  in  1796,  and  con- 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  229 

tinued  until,  swollen  to  enormous  proportions,  it  culminated  in  a 
deluge  of  blood  in  1861-1865.  For  four  cruel  years  that  deluge 
spread  itself  over  the  States  of  the  South,  and  at  the  end  of  four 
years  the  men  of  the  South  laid  down  their  arms  and  peace  was 
declared,  but  there  was  no  peace.  In  1898  the  Republican  party 
inaugurated  war  on  Spain  to  rescue  Cuba  from  Spanish  oppres- 
sion. As  soon  as  this  purpose  was  accomplished  the  victorious 
Republican  party  made  haste  to  resume  friendly  relations  with 
Spain,  and  when  Spanish  army  officers  visited  this  country  they 
were  courteously  treated,  not  one  unkind  word  spoken  or  written 
of  them  or  of  their  country.  How  differently  did  the  conquering 
Republicans  treat  the  conquered  people  of  the  South  after  peace 
was  declared  between  the  two  sections !  If  anything,  Republican 
hate  became  more  intense.  The  whole  reconstruction  period 
was  a  deadly  war  on  Southern  people,  and  the  more  base  and  cow- 
ardly because  waged  on  unarmed  men  and  women.  The  Republi- 
can party  declared  it  waged  the  war  of  the  60s  to  restore  the 
Union.  The  Union  was  restored  precisely  to  suit  their  ideas. 
Every  negro  in  the  land  was  freed.  Why,  then,  was  not  the  Re- 
publican party  satisfied  with  its  success,  as  it  was  satisfied  with 
its  success  in  1898?  The  answer  is  plain.  Because  the  war  of 
the  6o's  was  not  fought  to  restore  the  Union  or  to  free  negroes ; 
these  were  the  pretexts,  not  the  true  purpose,  of  that  war.  Re- 
publicans hated  the  Union,  and  had  little  love  for  any  enslaved 
people.  Republicans  waged  that  war  of  the  60s  to  down,  crush, 
kill  the  Democratic  party.  When  the  South  surrendered  and  peace 
was  proclaimed.  Northern  Democracy  took  courage,  lifted  up  its 
head,  fronted  and  faced  its  old  enemy  and  prepared  itself  to  re- 
sist any  further  torture  and  persecutions  of  Southern  Democ- 
racy. All  the  old  fear  of  Democracy  awakened  in  Republican 
hearts,  hence  its  increased  intensity  of  hate.  The  people  of  the 
South  were  talked  of  as  though  they  were  wild  beasts,  which  it 
were  virtue  to  exterminate  from  the  face  of  the  earth.  This 
feeling  suffered  no  abatement  until  after  Garfield's  death.  Dur- 
ing Garfield's  campaign  Republican  hate  amounted  to  insanity. 

The  Cincinnati  Enquirer,  January  15,   1881,  said: 

"Republican  hate  has  blasted  the  fair  heritage  of  our 
fathers." 

It  certainly  had  blasted  that  heritage,  and  for  a  time  seemed 
to  have  killed  liberty  itself.  Two  years  before  Daniel  Webster's 
death,  he  foresaw  and  predicted  the  evil  deeds  th-vt  party  would 
commit  should  it  ever  ascend  to  power. 


230  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

"If  these  fanatics,"  said  Webster,  "ever  get  the  power  in 
their  own  hands  they  will  override  the  Constitution,  set 
the  Supreme  Court  at  defiance,  change  and  make  laws  to  suit 
themselves,  lay  violent  hands  on  them  who  differ  in  opinion 
or  who  dare  to  question  their  fidelity,  and  finally  deluge  the 
country  with  blood." 

Every  word  of  this  prediction  came  to  pass.  The  Constitu- 
tion zvas  overridden.  The  Supreme  Court  zvas  set  at  defiance. 
Molent  hands  zvcre  laid  on  those  who  differed  in  opinion.  The 
country  icas  deluged  in  blood. 

Samples  of  Republican  Hate. 

In  1859,  at  a  meeting  in  Natick,  Massachusetts,  Senator  Wil- 
son, of  Massachusetts,  offered  the  following: 

"Resolved,  That  it  is  the  right  and  duty  of  Northern  men 
to  incite  and  aid  negroes  in  the  South  to  rise  in  insurrection." 

Seward  said : 

"I  would  like  to  see  the  negroes  of  the  South  rise  in 
blackest  insurrection." 

In  1859  the  New  York  Herald  said  : 

"Not  only  the  Republican  clergy  encourage  the  insurrec- 
tion of  negroes  in  the  South  to  bring  on  a  civil  war,  but  the 
gentler  sex  also." 

Hate  like  this  came  well  from  the  descendants  of  men  on 
whose  souls  rested  and  still  rests  the  horrors  of  the  "Middle  Pass- 
age." 

In  a  speech  delivered  by  Mr.  Joshua  R.  Giddings,  in  Kansas, 
he  said : 

"I  look  for  the  day  when  I  shall  see  a  negro  insurrec- 
tion in  the  South,  when  the  negroes  will  be  supplied  with  Brit- 
ish bayonets  and  commanded  by  British  officers,  and  shall 
wage  a  war  of  extermination  against  the  whites,  when  every 
white  man  shall  see  his  dwelling  in  flames  and  his  hearth 
polluted ;  and  though  I  ma}-  not  mock  at  their  calamity,  yet  I 
shall  hail  it  as  the  dawn  of  the  millennium." 

— Carpenter's  Logic  of   History. 

It  was  the  hope  of  witnessing  horrors  such  as  Giddings 
wished  to  see  that  made  Seward,  Medill,  Chandler  and  others, 
so  eager  to  inaugurate  war  on  the  South.  Republicans  confidently 
believed  that  at  the  first  tap  of  the  drum  the  negroes  would  rise 


CiTAP.  32  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  231 

in  "blackest  insurrection"  and  set  to  work  killing  white  women 
and  children.  The  amiable  conduct  of  the  negroes,  their  docile 
obedience  to  the  white  women  of  the  South  while  husbands, 
brothers  and  fathers  were  at  the  front  ])attling;  for  freedom,  was 
a  sore  disappointment  to  hating  hearts.  During  that  trying  time 
not  a  white  woman  on  the  great  plantations  was  afraid  of  ne- 
groes ;  not  a  white  woman  was  outraged  or  afraid  of  outrage.  The 
mistress  of  the  "gret-us,"  as  the  negroes  called  the  great  house, 
or  the  family  mansion,  never  locked  their  doors  at  night.  The 
negroes  on  the  place  were  their  protectors,  not  their  enemies. 
Rapes  of  young  matrons  and  maidens  and  little  girl  children  were 
not  known  in  the  South  until  after  the  savage  but  slumbering 
instincts  of  negro  nature  had  been  awakened  by  instructions  of 
and  companionship  with  those  who  hated  the  Southern  people  so 
insanely.  During  Buchanan's  administration  the  Rev.  Wm.  Du- 
vall,  unable  to  attend  in  person  and  address  a  convention  of  Re- 
publicans, sent  a  letter  to  be  read  to  the  convention.  A  short  ex- 
tract will  show  the  spirit  of  the  writer  and  of  the  convention  to 
which  he  wrote: 

"Long  before  this,"  wrote  the  Rev.  Duvall,  "an  army  of 
20,000  men  should  have  expelled  from  Washington  City  the 
Goths  and  Vandals  of  this  administration  (President  Buchan- 
an and  his  Cabinet).  The  people  of  the  North  are  ready  to 
do  this  work — only  let  the  capitalists  of  the  North  furnish  the 
money — and  the  men  are  ready  to  fight  this  propagandizing 
government.  I  sincerely  hope  that  a  civil  war  may  soon 
burst  upon  this  country.  I  want  to  see  it.  My  most  fervent 
prayer  is  that  England,  France  and  Spain  may  speedily  take 
this  accursed  nation  into  their  special  consideration  and  when 
the  time  arrives,  for  the  streets  and  cities  of  this  land  to  run 
with  blood  to  the  horses'  bridles.  If  this  writer  be  living  there 
will  be  one  heart  to  rejoice." 

— See  Carpenter's  Logic  of  History. 

The  Rev.  Charles  E.  Hodges  wrote  a  little  work  widely  cir- 
culated.    The   following  extract   will   show  its   spirit: 

"He  is  not  a  traitor  to  his  country,  but  a  true  patriot,  as 
well  as  a  Christian,  who  labors  for  the  dissolution  of  the 
Union.  We  do  not  expect  to  dissolve  the  Union  alone ;  we 
simply  ask  co-operation,  and  for  this  appeal  to  the  people. 
This  is  not  the  time  to  lay  out  the  plan  of  a  campaign,  to  open 
trenches,  dispose  of  forces  and  besiege  the  citadel.  The  thing 
to  be  now  done  is  to  urge  upon  every  man  this  question :  Are 
you  ready?"  _^ 


232  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

James  Watson  Webb  said  in  a  speech : 

"If  we  fail  at  the  ballot  we  will  drive  back  the  South  with 
fire  and  sword — so  help  me  God!" 

At  a  public  meeting  held  in  Buffalo,  New  York,  some  years 
before  the  South  seceded,  Governor  Reeder,  of  Kansas,  spoke 
as  follows: 

"When  I  am  on  the  trail  of  the  enemy  against  whom  I 
have  a  deadly  hate,  I  will  follow  him  with  cat-like  tread ;  I 
will  not  strike  until  I  can  strike  him  dead.  I  do  not  wish  to 
give  the  South  notice  of  our  intentions.  When  the  time 
comes  to  strike  I  want  the  South  to  have  the  first  notice  of 
the  blow  in  the  blow  itself." 

Hate  blinded  this  man  Reeder  and  his  hearers  to  the  base- 
ness involved  in  the  declaration  that  he  would  steal  upon  the  ob- 
ject of  his  hate  as  the  tiger  steals  upon  his  prey,  and  strike  as  ti- 
gers and  assassins  strike — in  the  dark  and  without  warning. 

Before  the  first  blow  of  war  was  struck  the  Chicago 
Tribune  jauntily  said  to  the  Eastern  States : 

"Get  out  of  the  way ;  we  of  Illinois  can  fight  this  battle. 
In  three  months  Illinois  can  whip  the  South." 

Before  a  battle  was  fought  the  New  York  Tribune,  which 
time  and  again  had  declared  the  South's  right  to  secede,  right  to 
independence,  said: 

"The  hanging  of  traitors  is  sure  to  begin  before  the 
month  is  over.  The  nations  of  Europe  may  rest  assured 
that  Jeff  Davis  will  be  swinging  from  the  battlements  of 
Washington  at  least  by  the  Fourth  of  July.  We  spit  upon 
a  later  and  longer  deferred  justice." 
The  New  York  Times  said: 
"Let  us  make  quick  work.  The  rebellion  is  an  unborn 
tadpole.  A  strong  pull  will  do  our  work  effectively  in  thirty 
days." 

The  Philadelphia  Press  said : 

"No  man  of  sense  can  for  a  moment  doubt  that  the  war 
will  end  in  a  month.  The  rebels,  a  mere  band  of  ragamuffins, 
will  fly  on  our  approach  like  chaff  before  the  wind.  The 
Northern  people  are  simply  invincible." 

Seward  said : 

"It  is  erroneous  to  suppose  any  war  exists  in  the  United 
States.     There  :s  only  an  ephemeral  insurrection." 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  233 

The  battle  of  Bull  Run  was  fought  July  21,  1861.    Prominent 

.Republicans,  having  no  doubt  of  victory, boastingly  invited  friends, 
Senators,  Congressmen,  their  wives  and  daughters  to  go  out  and 
"see  the  rebels  run."  "This,"  they  gleefully  said,  "will  be  your 
only  chance  to  see  anything  like  a  battle."  Accordingly,  long 
strings  of  carriages  filled  with  fine  ladies  escorted  by  gentlemen  on 
horseback,  drove  out  of  Washington  City  that  21st  day  of  July, 
1 86 1,  followed  by  express  wagons  loaded  with  eatables  for  lunch- 
eon, baskets  of  champagne,  bottles  of  brandy,  beer,  etc.  They 
prepared  for  a  pleasant  picnic,  but  their  return  was  not  quite  so 
joyous.  However,  there  were  some  loaded  wagons  that  went 
from  Washington  that  morning  which  never  returned.  They  were 
captured  by  Confederates,  driven  southward,  and  their  contents 
divided  among  the  women  of  Virginia  as  mementoes  showing  the 
spirit  of  Republicans  at  that  time.  Some  of  these  mementoes 
which  escaped  the  pillaging  and  burning  by  the  Union  armies 
now  hang  in  Southern  halls  for  Southern  children  to  wonder  at — 
iron  shackles  and  iron  balls 'for  rebel  feet,  and  ropes  and  hand- 
cuffs for  rebel  hands.  Republicans  confidently  expected  to  see 
long  strings  of  Southern  soldliers  driven  into  Washington,  pain- 
fully dragging  iron  balls  on  their  fettered  feet,  handcuffs  on  their 
hands.  Republicans  often  declared  that  the  negro  "would  be  de- 
lighted to  get  a  chance  to  cut  their  masters'  throats."  They  con- 
fidently expected  negroes  to  rise  in  "blackest  insurrection"  and 
help  them  burn  houses  and  barns  and  kill  Southern  whites.  When 
B.  F.  Butler,  surnamed  the  Beast,  was  commander  of  New  Or- 
leans, he  was  anxious  to  see  negroes  rise  and  kill  white  women 
and  children  in  La  Fourche  Parish,  in  which  were  only  a  few  old 
white  men  and  many  thousand  blacks.  Butler  unfolded  these  views 
to  General  Weitzel,  who  commanded  that  parish,  and  that  officer 
refused  to  engage  in  the  work. 

"The  idea,"  wrote  Weitzel  to  Butler,  "of  a  negro  insur- 
rection is  heartrending.  I  will  resign  my  command  rather 
than  induce  negroes  to  outrage  and  murder  the  helpless 
whites." 

In  1863  Morrow  B.  Lowry,  Republican  Senator  in  Penn- 
sylvania, in  a  public  speech  stated  that  he  had  declared  that  if 
any  negro  would  bring  him  his  "Rebel"  master's  head  he  would 
give  him  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  of  his  master's  plantation. 
Not  a  "Rebel"  head  did  any  negro  take  to  Mr.  Lowry.  Russell, 
correspondent  of  the  London  Times,  was  in  Washington  when  the 
battle  of  Bull  Run  was  fought.  On  page  176  of  his  diary  Rus- 
sell says: 


234  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

"The  first  Confederate  soldiers  captured  were  taken  to 
the  station  and  mobbed  in  the  streets.  Men  dressed  as  Union 
soldiers  hurled  every  kind  of  missile  they  could  lay  their 
hands  on  at  the  prisoners,  pelting  them  with  mud  and  filthy 
words.  It  was  with  difficulty  the  guard  could  save  the 
prisoners  from  being  killed." 

The  unfortunate  Confederate  soldiers  shut  up  in  Northern 
prisons  describe  the  various  cruelties,  the  tortures  perpetrated  on 
helpless  Southern  soldiers.  Many  were  killed  wantonly  by  bru- 
tal negro  guards,  who  were  rewarded,  never  punished,  for  suc^ 
deeds.  Many  died  of  starvation  and  cold.  To  cover  up  their  own 
cruelty,  Republicans  were  eternally  accusing  the  South  of  cruelty. 

On  page  163  of  Russell's  diary  he  says: 

"The  stories  which  have  been  so  sedulously  spread  of 
the  barbarity  and  cruelty  of  the  Confederates  to  all  the 
wounded  Union  men  ought  to  be  set  at  rest  by  the  printed 
statement  of  the  eleven  Union  surgeons,  just  released,  who 
have  come  back  from  Richmond,  where  they  were  sent  after 
their  capture  on  the  field  of  Bull  Run,  with  the  most  distinct 
testimony  that  the  Confederates  treated  their  prisoners  with 
humanity.  Who  are  the  miscreants  who  try  to  make  the 
evil  feeling,  quite  strong  enough  as  it  is,  perfectly  fiendish  by 
asserting  that  the  rebels  burned  the  wounded  in  hospitals 
and  bayoneted  them  as  they  lay  helpless  on  the  battlefield  ?" 

Who  were  they  ?  Russell  did  not  know  that  lies  of  this  nat- 
ure were  only  part  of  the  gospel  of  hate  so  long  preached  by  the 
Republican  party  and  its  progenitors,  the  Federalists  of  New 
England.  Never  for  a  moment  did  those  lies  cease  to  be  told. 
The  testimony  of  the  eleven  surgeons  was  blown  away  on  the 
wind  and  the  lies  went  on.  Lies  of  this  sort  were  credited  by  the 
prison  guards,  hence  their  cruel  treatment  of  Southern  soldiers. 

On  page  152  Russell  says  of  Republican  lies  told  in  Wash- 
ington : 

"Such  capacity  for  enormous  lying,  both  in  creation  and 
absorption,  the  world  never  before  witnessed." 

Even  at  the  early  stage  of  the  war  Seward,  the  vindictive, 
gloated  over  the  prospect  of  the  South's  sufferings.  In  the  Union 
army  were  large  numbers  of  the  lowest  class  of  men  from 
European  kingdoms.     Of  these  Seward  said  to  Russell: 

"Thousands  of  half  savage  Germans  come  over,  enlist  in 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  235 

our  army  and  plunder  and  destroy  as  if  they  were  living  in 
the  days  of  Agricola." 

— Russell's  Diary,  page  211. 

Well  informed  Englishmen  well  knew  how  savage  was  the 
hate  Republicans  felt  toward  the  South.  The  London  Telegraph 
tersely  put  it  thus: 

"The  North  simply  demands  blood,  blood,  blood.  Do- 
minion, spoliation,  confiscation." 

At  a  Republican  meeting  in  Cadiz,  Wisconsin,  March  26, 
1863,  the  following  was  unanimously  passed: 

"Resolved,  That  we  hail  any  policy  of  our  Government 
toward  the  South,  be  it  annihilation,  extermination,  statva- 
tion  or  damnation." 

What  virulence  of  hate  lies  in  these  words! 
Cassius  Clay  said    in  a  public  speech : 

"I  find  fault  with  Lincoln,  not  because  he  suspended  the 
habeas  corpus,  but  instead  of  doing  it  by  a  dash  of  the  pen, 
he  did  not  do  it  by  'ropes  around  the  necks  of  the  rebels.'  " 

"We'll  hang  'em  yet!"  cried  out  a  voice  from  the  crowd. 
"Yes,"  rejoined  Clay,  "the  hanging  of  such  men  as  Seymour 
and  Wood  will  be  true  philanthropy." 

Seymour  was  the  Democratic  Governor  of  New  York.  Wood 
was  a  distinguished  Democrat  of  New  York.  All  through  the 
history  of  the  Republican  party  may  be  seen  evidence  that  the 
basic  foundation  of  Republican  animosity  toward  the  South  was 
hatred  of  Democracy  and  Democrats.  McClellan  was  only  a 
half-hearted  Democrat,  but  Republican  hatred  of  McClellan  was 
intense.    Witness  this  from  the  Chicago  Tribune : 

"Give  us  rebel  victories,  let  our  armies  be  defeated ; 
let  Maryland  be  conquered,  Washington  captured,  the  Presi- 
dent exiled,  our  Government  destroyed.  Give  us  these  and 
any  other  calamity  that  can  result  from  war  and  ruin  sooner 
than  a  victory  with  McClellan  as  General." 
\  — Carpenter's  Logic  of  Llistory. 

Wendell  Phillips,  who,  before  blood  began  to  flow,  eloquently 
declared  that  the  South  was  in  the  right,  that  Lincoln  had  no 
right  to  send  armed  men  to  coerce  her,  after  battles  begun  seemed 
to  become  drunk  on  the  fumes  of  blood  and  mad  for  more  than 
battlefields  afforded.     In  a  speech  delivered  in  Beecher's  church, 


236  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

to  a  large  and  presumably  a  Christian  congregation,  Phillips  made 
the  following  remarkable  declaration: 

"I  do  not  believe  in  battles  ending  this  war.  You  may 
plant  a  fort  in  every  district  of  the  South,  you  may  take  pos- 
session of  her  capitals  and  hold  them  with  your  armies,  but 
you  have  not  begun  to  subdue  her  people.  I  know  it  seems 
something  like  absolute  barbarian  conquest,  I  allow  it,  but 
/  do  not  believe  there  will  he  any  peace  until  347,000  men  of 
the  South  are  either  hanged  or  exiled."     (Cheers). 

Why  the  precise  number,  347,000,  does  not  appear.  If  the 
hanging  at  one  fell  swoop  of  347,000  men  and  women  seemed  to 
Phillips  something  like  barbarian  conquest,  it  would  be  interesting 
to  know  what  would  have  appeared  truly  barbarian.  History  re- 
cords some  crimes  of  such  stupendous  magnitude,  even  to  this  day 
men  shudder  at  their  mention. 

In  the  Thirteenth  Century,  within  two  hours,  while  Sicilian 
pirests  were  chanting  vesper  songs  in  Christian  churches,  8,000 
men  were  slaughtered.  In  the  Eighth  Century  Charlemagne 
hanged  4,000  men  in  one  batch.  In  the  Sixteenth  Century,  on 
St.  Bartholomew's  Day,  if  we  take  the  lowest  estimate,  30,000,  if 
we  take  the  highest,  70,000,  innocent  men  and  women  were  butch- 
ered as  fast  as  human  hands  could  do  the  work.  In  France, 
during  the  revolution,  one  fine  September  day,  1,000 
men  were  put  to  death.  During  the  Reign  of  Terror, 
some  estimate  2,000,  others  4,000,  human  heads  were 
chopped  off  by  the  guillotine ;  but  these  4,000  were  killed  day  by 
day.  Was  Mr.  Phillips  and  his  party  ambitious  to  ovettop  all  of 
these  stupendous  crimes  and  win  for  himself  and  his  party  the 
highest  record  in  the  calendar  of  crime?  Marat  was  the  monster 
of  the  Reign  of  Terror.  Becoming  impatient  at  the  killing  daily* 
done  by  the  guillotine,  Marat  demanded  it  be  given  at  one  batch 
an  extra  250,000  heads.  Was  it  Mr.  Phillips'  ambition  to  reach  a 
higher  pinnacle  of  infamy  than  Marat  tiad  attained  ?  Is  it  indeed 
true  that  the  heart  in  a  human  breast  sometimes  ceases  to  be  hu- 
man, and  a  wolf's  ramps  in  its  place? 

While  the  war  was  fiercely  raging  a  meeting  was  called  in 
New  York  City  for  the  relief  of  the  sick  and  wounded  Union  sol- 
diers. Parson  Brownlow  made  a  speech  which  elicited  from  the 
Republicans  frequent  and  loud  applause.  The  following  extract 
will  show  the  spirit  of  hate  that  ruled  the  hour : 

"If  I  had  the  power,"  said  Brownlow,  'T  would  arm  and 
uniform  in  the  Federal  habiliments  every  wolf  and  panther 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  237 

and  catamount  and  tiger  and  bear  in  the  mountains  of  Amer- 
ica ;  every  crocodile  in  the  swamps  of  Florida  and  South  Car- 
olina ;  every  negro  in  the  Southern  Confederacy,  and  every 
-  devil  in  hell,  and  turn  them  on  the  rebels  in  the  South,  if  it 
exterminated  every  rebel  from  the  face  of  God's  green  earth 
— every  man,  woman  and  child  south  of  Mason  and  Dixon's 
line.  I  would  like  to  see  Richmond  and  Charleston  captured 
by  negro  troops  commanded  by  Butler,  the  beast.  We  will 
crowd  the  rebels  into  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  drown  the 
entire  race,  as  the  devil  did  the  hogs  in  the  Sea  of  Galilee." 
{Long  and  loud  applause.) 

After  this  fine  burst  of  ferocity  Lincoln,  Seward  and  Stanton 
thought  it  would  be  a  good  thing  to  have  Parson  Brownlow  Gov- 
ernor of  Tennessee,  from  which  vantage  ground  he  could  harass 
and  torture  the  white  people  of  that  State  at  his  leisure.  By  Fed- 
eral aid  the  negroes  and  carpetbaggers  in  Tennessee  put  Brown- 
low  in  the  Governor's  office,  which  he  abused  by  cruelties,  rascali- 
ties and  oppressions  of  every  sort.  English  writers  make  fre- 
quent mention  of  the  bitter  hate  Republicans  felt  toward  the  con- 
quered South.  From  an  English  work,  published  in  1891,  called 
"Black  America/'  I  take  the  following : 

"In  spite  of  the  fact  that  all  resistance  to  Federal  author- 
ity had  ceased,  and  that  according  to  Mr.  Justice  Nelson  of 
the  Supreme  Court,  the  States  in  which  the  civil  government 
had  been  restored  under  the  pacific  Presidential  plan  were 
entitled  to  all  the  rights  of  States  in  the  Union,  in  spite  of 
these  facts  Congress  solemnly  decided  that  the  war  was  not 
over,  and  in  March,  1867,  Congress  passed  the  reconstruc- 
tion act,  over  President  Johnson's  veto.  These  acts  annulled 
the  States'  government,  then  in  peaceful  operation,  divided 
the  States  into  military  districts,  and  placed  them  under  mar- 
tial law ;  enfranchised  the  negroes,  disfranchised  all  white 
men,  whether  pardoned  or  not,  who  had  participated  in  the 
war  against  the  Union,  if  they  had  previously  held  any  execu- 
tive, legislative  or  judicial  office  under  the  State  or  Federal 
Government." 

So  bitter,  blinding  venomous  was  Republican  hate,  high  men 
in  that  party  openly  and  gleefully  exulted  in  the  cruelty  of  the 
so-called  reconstruction  acts.     Garfield  was  one  of  this  sort. 

"This  bill,"  said  Garfield  joyfully,  "first  sets  out  by  lay- 
ing its  hand  on  the  rebel  States'  governments,  and  taking  the 
very  breath  of  life  out  of  them.     In  the  next  place  it  puts  a 


23S  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

bayonet  at  the  breast  of  every  rebel  in  the  South.  In  the  next 
it  leaves  in  the  hands  of  Congress  utter  and  absolute  power 
over  the  people  of  the  South." 

Percy  Gregg,  the  English  historian,  in  his  history  of  the 
United  States,  says: 

"The  reconstruction  policy  was  at  once  dishonest  and 
vindictive.  The  Congressional  majority  (Republican)  were 
animated  not  merely  by  selfish  designs,  but  by  rabid  hatred 
of  the  South's  people  which  had  fought  so  gallantly  for  what 
the  best  jurists  of  America  believed  to  be  their  moral  and 
constitutional  right." 

For  what  the  foremost  men  in  the  Republican  party  had  de- 
clared their  right.  Another  English  writer  of  great  eminence,  An- 
thony Trollope,  was  in  this  country  during  the  reconstruction 
period,  and  wrote  of  it  thus : 

"I  hold  that  tyranny  never  went  beyond  this.  Never 
has  there  been  a  more  terrible  condition  imposed  upon  a  fall- 
en people.  For  an  Italian  to  feel  an  Austrian  over  him,  for 
a  Pole  to  feel  a  Russian  over  him,  has  been  bad  indeed,  but 
it  has  been  left  for  the  political  animosity  of  the  Republicans 
of  the  North — men  who  themselves  reject  all  contact  with  the 
negro — to  subject  the  Southern  people  to  dominance  from  the 
African  who  yesterday  was  their  slave.  The  dungeon  chains 
were  knocked  off  the  captive  in  order  that  he  may  be  har- 
nessed as  a  beast  of  burden  to  the  captive's  chariot." 

We  will  give  another  passage  from  Gregg,  the  English  histo- 
rian: 

"The  devastation  of  the  Pallatine  hardly  exceeded  the 
desolation  and  misery  wrought  by  the  Republican  invasion  and 
conquest  of  the  South.  No  conquered  nation  of  modern  days, 
not  Poland  under  the  heel  of  Nicholas,  not  Spain  or  Russia 
under  that  of  Napoleon,  suffered  from  such  individual  and 
collective  ruin,  or  saw  before  them  so  frightful  a  prOspect  as 
the  States  dragged  by  force,  in  April,  1865.  under  the  "best 
government  in  the  world.'"  (Page  375,  Gregg's  History  of 
United  States.) 

When  the  bill  to  confiscate  land  in  the  South  was  before  Con- 
gress, the  English  language  seemed  to  be  inadequate  to  convey  the 
insane  hate  of  the  Republican  party  toward  the  people  of  the 
South.  A  short  extract  from  Thaddeus  Stevens'  speech  will  show 
something  of  the  spirit  of  that  time: 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  239 

"Why,"  cried  Stevens,  his  face  livid,  his  Hps  flecked  with 
foam,  "why  all  the  carnage  and  devastation  we  have  had? 
It  was  that  treason  might  be  put  down  and  traitors  punished. 
I  say,  the  traitor  has  ceased  to  be  a  citizen  ;  he  has  become  a 
public  enemy.  The  South's  land  must  be  seized  and  divided 
and  conveyed  to  loyal  men,  black  or  white.  This  confiscation 
bill  can  be  condemned  only  by  the  criminals  and  their  friends, 
and  by  that  unmanly  kind  of  men  whose  mental  and  moral 
vigor  has  melted  into  a  fluent  weakness,  which  they  mistake 
for  mercy,  and  by  those  religionists  who  mistake  meanness 
for  Christianity." 

Conventions  were  called  in  different  States  to  arouse  the  peo- 
ple to  the  fury  of  another  war  on  the  crushed,  conquered,  dis- 
armed South.  A  convention  was  held  in  Philadelphia  in  1866,  the 
purpose  of  which  seemed  to  stir  up  hate  toward  President  John- 
son, and  to  fire  the  old  soldiers  with  a  desire  to  march  down  on 
the  South  and  "finish  the  war."  General  B.  F.  Butler  was  a  big 
man  in  that  convention,  and  made  venomous  speeches.  With  one 
blood-streaked  eye  turned  Southward  toward  the  land  he  hated, 
and  the  other  downward  toward  the  hot  home  bad  souls  are  doom- 
ed to  dwell  in,  Butler  shouted  out : 

"By  their  rebellion  the  men  of  the  South  forfeited  their 
property,  their  liberty,  their  lives,  every  right  they  possessed. 
Unfortunately  they  were  not  hanged,  but  we  will  march  on 
them  once  more,  and  woe  to  him  who  opposes  us !  I  say," 
Butler  shouted,  his  terrifying  eyes  still  turned  in  different 
directions,  "I  say,  keep  the  men  of  the  South  out  of  the  Union 
until  the  heavens  melt !  And  if  that  should  not  come  to  pass 
in  our  day,  we  will  swear  our  sons  to  keep  them  out."  (Long 
and  loud  applause). 

Zack  Chandler  made  a  fierce  attack  on  President  Johnson, 
whom   leading  Republicans  had  come  fiercely   to   hate,   because 
Johnson's  policy  toward  the  South  was  less  cruel  than  theirs : 
"Who  is  Andy  Johnson?"  wrathfully  demanded  Chand- 
ler.   "What  is  Andy  Johnson's  policy?    Andy  Johnson  has  no 
more  right  to  a  policy  than  my  horse  has.     If  Johnson  does 
not  stop  about  now  he  will  learn  that  treason  is  a  crime,  and 
that  it  shall  be  punished." 

Brownlow  was  a  very  big  man  at  that  convention.  Brown- 
fow,  like  Johnson,  had  fled  from  the  South  and  entered  the  camp 
of  her  foes.  Lincoln  had  disliked  Johnson,  but  had  held  Brown- 
low  in  much  favor.     Before  going  to  the  Philadelphia  convention 


240  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

Brownlow  made  a  speech  to  the  carpetbaggers  and  negroes  of 
Nashville,  Tenn.    The  following  extract  will  show  its  spirit: 

"I  am  one  of  those,"  said  Brownlow,  "who  believe  the 
war  has  ended  too  soon.  We  have  whipped  the  rebels,  but 
not  enough.  The  loyal  masses  constitute  an  overwhelming 
majority  of  the  people  of  this  country,  and  they  intend  to 
march  again  on  the  South,  and  intend  this  second  war  shall 
be  no  child's  play.  The  second  army  of  invasion  will,  as 
they  ought  to,  make  the  entire  South  as  God  found  the  earth, 
without  form  and  void.  They  will  not,  and  ought  not  to, 
leave  one  rebel  fence-rail,  outhouse,  one  dwelling,  in  the 
eleven  seceded  States.  As  for  the  Rebel  population,  let  them 
be  exterminated.  When  the  second  war  is  wound  up,  which 
should  be  done  with  swift  destruction,  let  the  land  be  sur- 
veyed and  sold  out  to  pay  expenses." 

This  speech  so  highly  pleased  Republicans  that  the  Philadel- 
phia convention  gave  Brownlow  a  boisterous  welcome.  The  fol- 
lowing extract  is  from  Brownlow's  address  to  the  convention : 

"I  mean  to  have  something  to  say  about  the  division  of 
your  forces  the  next  time  you  march  on  the  South.  I  would 
divide  your  army  into  three  grand  divisions.  Let  the  first  be 
armed  and  equipped  as  the  law  requires,  with  small  arms  and 
artillery.  Let  them  be  the  largest  division,  and  do  the  killing. 
Let  the  second  division  be  armed  with  pine  torches  and  spirits 
of  turpentine,  and  let  them  do  the  burning !  Let  the  third  and 
last  division  be  armed  with  surveyors'  compasses  and  chains, 
that  will  survey  the  land  and  settle  it  with  loyal  people." 

Brownlow's  speech  so  much  pleased  Republicans  they  invited 
him  to  go  about  repeating  his  speech  to  stir  up  the  old  soldiers  to 
the  fury  of  a  second  war  on  the  South.  Governor  Yates  of  Illinois 
was  at  that  convention,  also  eager  for  a  second  war  on  the  South. 
In  his  speech    Yates  said: 

"Illinois  raised  250,000  troops  to  fight  the  South,  and 
now  we  are  ready  to  raise  500,000  more  to  finish  the  good 
work." 

In  another  speech  Brownlow  exhorted  the  soldiers  to  march 
down  on  the  South,  to  "burn  and  kill!  burn  and  kill!"  until  the 
whole  rebel  race  was  exterminated.  These  sentiments  were 
praised  as  "truly  loyal."  These  two  words,  "truly  loyal,"  were 
so  prostituted  by  Republicans  during  the  war.  and  for  years  after, 
not  for  a  thousand  years  will  they  regain  their  purity  of  meaning. 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  241 

Not  a  man  of  the  Republican  party,  not  a  paper  condemned  (so 
far  as  I  can  discover)  these  rabid  utterances.  On  the  contrary, 
the  more  rabid  and  malignant  a  man  was,  the  higher  he  rose  in 
Republican  favor.  Richard  Busted,  a  carpetbagger  from  New 
York,  who  was  playing  the  part  of  Judge  in  Alabama  "Territory," 
in  a  speech  made  in  New  York  City,  spoke  as  follows : 

"I  would  keep  the  rebels  out  in  the  cold  till  their  teeth 
chattered  to  the  music  of  the  Union.  (Applause).  Keep  them 
out  in  the  cold  till  they  learn  that  treason  is  the  greatest  crime 
of  the  century !  I  would  keep  them  there  till  the  last  trumpet 
sounded!  I  say,  better  a  boundless  waste  of  territory,  filled 
with  owls  and  bats,  than  that  the  Southern  States  should  be 
occupied  with  such  men  !  (Cheers).  I  tell  you,  although  there 
may  be  forgiveness  before  God  for  the  crime  of  the  South, 
there  can  be  no  forgiveness  before  men."     (Long  applause). 

The  carpetbagger,  Hamilton,  who  was  playing  the  part  of 
despot-governor  over  Texas,  was  eager  to  have  another  army 
sent  down  on  the  devastated  South.  In  his  speech  at  the  Phila- 
delphia convention,  the  carpetbagger,   Hamilton,   said: 

"Prepare  your  hearts,  and  your  guns,  and  your  swords, 
for  another  conflict.  It  is  bound  to  come.  Get  yourselves 
ready."  "We  are  ready,"  shouted  back  a  blood-thirsty  Re- 
publican. "We  are  ready !  We'll  march  down  and  finish  the 
Rebs !" 

.  About  the  same  time  a  convention  was  held  in  Syracuse,  New 
York,  in  which  a  second  war  on  the  South  was  urged.  Lyman 
Tremaine  was  president.  In  his  address  Mr.  Tremaine  said  of 
that  second  war: 

"At  the  very  first  tap  of  the  drum  an  army  of  veteran 
troops  capable  of  overwhelming  all  opposition  will  come  to 
the  rescue." 

Rescue  of  what?   Of  whom?    Who,  za'hat  was  in  danger? 

Were  these  men  absolutely  insane  with  hate  ?  Was  it  possible 
they  still  apprehended  danger  from  the  disarmed  South?  They 
well  knew  if  they  sent  another  army  on  the  South  it  would 
not  be  against  armed  men  ;  they  knew,  as  Brownlow  had  declared, 
all  their  army  would  have  to  do  would  be  to  "kill  and  burn !  kill 
and  burn !"  to  the  dreadful  end. 

"Traitors,"  continued  President  Tremaine,  "must  be 
punished.  Our  soldiers  will  proceed  to  punish  them.  This 
time  it  will  be  effectually  done  by  our  soldiers  without  the  in- 


242  Facts  and  Falsehoods.        ^       Chap.     32 

tervention    of    President  Johnston,    or   Congress,    judge    or 
jury." 

Yet  this  man  Tremaine  had  once  possessed  a  fair  share  of 
reason  and  some  sense  of  justice.  In  the  early  days  of  the  war, 
while  speaking  of  the  Southern  people's  resistance  to  the  armed 
invasion  of  their  country,  Tremaine  said  to  his  audience: 

"But,  gentlemen,  while  I  do  not  justify  secession  in  the 
abstract,  we  must  not  forget  that  the  South  has  had  the  most 
terrible  provocation  to  which  civilized  men  have  ever  been 
subjected.  When  they  found  the  Government  turned  into  an 
engine  of  war  and  oppression — make  the  case  your  own,  and 
then  make  proper  allowance  for  our  Southern  friends- — I  ask 
whether  they  are  doing  very  differently  from  what  human 
nature  would  do  under  such  circumstances?" 

It  seemed  as  if  Republicans  lay  awake  at  night  devising  new 
ways  of  manifesting  hate  toward  the  people  of  the  South.  On 
May  25,  1866,  a  man  by  the  name  of  Bond,  in  the  House  of  Rep- 
resentatives, gave  notice  as  follows: 

"I  will  introduce  a  bill  to  adopt  the  gray  uniform  of  the 
so-called  Confederate  States  to  be  the  uniform  of  the  convicts 
in  the  State  penitentiaries,  and  that  the  prisoner  convicted  of 
manslaughter  be  entitled  to  wear  the  ensign  of  rank  of  a 
Colonel,  and  so  on  down  to  the  lowest  grade  in  crime." 

In  the  summer  of  1863  the  Washington  Chronicle  reported  a 
speech  made  by  Jim  Lane,  Republican  Senator  from  Kansas,  in 
Washington  City: 

"I  would  like,"  said  Senator  Lane,  "  to  live  long  enough 
to  see  every  white  man  in  South  Carolina  in  hell,  and  the 
negroes  inheriting  their  territory.  (Loud  applause.)  It  would 
not  any  day  wound  my  feelings  to  find  the  dead  bodies  of 
every  rebel  sympathizer  pierced  with  bullet  holes,  in  every 
street  and  alley  in  Washington  City.  (Applause.)  Yes;  I 
would  regret  the  waste  of  powder  and  lead.  I  would  rather 
have  these  Copperheads  hung  and  the  ropes  saved  for  future 
use.  (Loud  applause.)  I  would  like  to  see  them  dangle  until 
their  stinking  bodies  would  rot  and  fall  to  the  ground  piece  by 
piece."      (Applause  and  laughter.) 

Nothing  done  by  the  Republicans  after  the  war  ended  mani- 
fested more  malignant  hatred  than  the  way  they  treated  and  lied 
on  the  President  of  the  Southern  Confederacy.  This  western 
continent  has  nroduced  no  man  of  whom  it  has  more  reason  to  be 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  243 

proud  than  Jefferson  Davis.  Brave,  gentle,  kindly,  a  true  Chris- 
tian in  every  walk  of  life,  a  patriot  of  the  truest  type,  an  ardent 
lover  of  the  liberty  which  inspired  the*  men  of  '76,  Davis  shouUl 
be  held  'up  before  the  youth  of  America  as  deserving  esteem, 
reverence,  emulation.  When  the  war  ended  the  Republicans  se- 
lected Mr.  Davis  as  the  chief  object  on  which  to  pour  foul  streams 
of  hate.  The  English  language  was  ransacked  in  search  of  'vile 
epithets  to  throw  upon  him ;  hunian  ingenuity  was  taxed  to  invent 
base  falsehoods  to  defame  him.  The  murder  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was 
seized  as  a  pretext  to  charge  him  with  the  crime  of  assassination. 
Without  the  faintest  shadow  of  evidence  Republicans  made  haste 
to  proclaim  to  the  world  that  in  their  bureau  of  military  justice 
they  had  proof  that  Mr.  Davis  was  guilty  of  the  assassination  of 
Lincoln.  $100,000  were  offered  for  his  arrest.  When  arrested 
he  was  cast  into  prison  and  treated  as  a  felon.  Every  species  of 
indignity  and  insult  was  heaped  upon  him.  Though  old,  feeble, 
sick,  and  strictly  guarded,  brutal  men  were  ordered  to  enter  his 
cell,  throw  him  down  and  weld  iron  chains  and  balls  on  his  ankles, 
ordered  by  the  present  Lieutenant-General  Nelson  A  Miles.  In 
vain  Mr.  Davis  requested  to  be  taken  into  open  court  and  tried  on 
the  charges  made.  They  dared  not  try  him  in  any  court.  They 
knew  they  had  no  particle  of  evidence  on  which  to  convict  him. 
Were  he  tried  for  Lincoln's  murder,  tJicy  would  be  proved  guilty 
of  lying,  not  Mr.  Davis  of  murder.  Were  he  tried  for  treason, 
not  Mr.  Davis,  but  the  whole  Republican  party,  would  be  proved 
guilty  of  treason — treason  to  the  Constitution — treason  to  the 
principles  of  '/6.  Not  daring  to  try  Mr.  Davis,  too  venomously 
cruel  to  restore  him  to  freedom,  they  kept  him  in  prison  two  years 
and  every  day  of  those  two  years,  and  almost  every  day  after- 
ward for  more  than  a  dozen  years,  Republicans  continued  to  pour 
out  on  Mr.  Davis'  name  streams  of  sulphuric  hate. 

When  Republicans  proclaimed  that  Mr.  Davis  and  other  dis- 
tinguished men  of  the  South  had  assassinated  Lincoln,  there  was 
not  a  human  on  earth  outside  of  the  hate-crazed  Republican  party 
who  believed  that  charge.  Earl  Russell,  irom  the  floor  of  Parlia- 
ment, voiced  the  sentiment  of  all  England  when  he  said : 

"It  is  not  possible  that  men  who  have  borne  themselves 
so  nobly  in  their  struggle  for  independence  could  be  guilty  of 
assassination." 

To  this  Harper's  Weekly  replied  with  the  hate-born  lie : 
'Tf  it  seems  too  incredible  to  be  true  that  the  rebel  lead- 
ers were  guilty  of  Lincoln's  assassination,  it  must  be  remem- 


244  Facts  and  Falsehoods,  Chap.    32 

bered  that  Lincoln's  murder  is  no  more  atrocious  than  many 
crimes  of  which  Davis  is  notoriously  guilty." 

From  the  floor  of  Congress  Mr.  Thaddeus  Stevens,  March 
19,  1867,  poured  out  Republican  hate  in  this  fashion: 

"While  I  would  not  be  bloody-minded,  yet  if  I  had  my 
way  I  would  long  ago  have  organized  a  military  tribunal 
under  military  power,  and  I  would  have  put  Jefferson  Davis 
and  all  the  members  of  his  Cabinet  on  trial  for  the  murders  at 
Andersonville  and  Salisbury,  for  the  shooting  down  of  our 
prisoners  of  war  in  cold  blood — this  man  who  has  murdered 
a  thousand  men,  robbed  a  thousand  widows  and  orphans,  and 
burned  down  a  thousand  houses." 

In  Harper's  Weekly  of  June,  1865,  in  this  little  burst  of  hate : 
"The  murder  of  President  Lincoln  furnished  the  final 
proof  of  the  ghastly  spirit  of  the  rebellion.  Davis  inspired 
the  murder  of  Lincoln." 

If  the  murder  of  Mr.  Lincoln  furnished  the  proof  of  any  one 
thing,  it  is  proof  of  the  truth  of  Christ's  saying : 

"They  that  take  the  sword  shall  perish  by  the  sword." 
Boutwell  of  Massachusetts  introduced  a  resolution  into  Con- 
gress as  follows: 

"Be  it  resolved,  That  Jefferson  Davis  shall  be  held  and 
tried  on  the  charge  of  killing  prisoners  and  murdering  Abra- 
ham Lincoln." 

John  Forney,  Clerk  of  the  Senate,  in  the  Washington  Chron- 
icle, said: 

"The  judiciary  has  ample  evidence  of  Davis'  guilt  of 
Lincoln's  murder,  and  of  the  murder  of  our  soldiers  in  his 
prisons." 

Not  one  particle  of  such  evidence  was  in  existence.    In  Har- 
per's Weekly   of  June  17,  1865,  we  find  this  hate-born  lie: 

"Davis  is  as  guilty  of  Lincoln's  murder  as  Booth.     Da- 
vis was  conspicuous  for  every  extreme  of  ferocity,  inhuman- 
ity and  malignity.    He  was  responsible  for  untold  and  unim- 
aginable cruelties  practiced  on  loyal  citizens  in  the  South." 
Mr.  Davis  was  conspicuous  for  Christian  mercy  and  gentle- 
ness of  character,  as  well  as  for  wide  culture.  He  was  morally 
and  physically  one  of  the  bravest  men  this  country  has  produced. 
In  Harper's  Weekly  of  June  10,  we  find  this : 

"In  its  last  struggle  the  South's  expiring  force  was  con- 
centrated into  one  crime  (the  murder  of  Lincoln)  so  black  the 
shuddering  world  everywhere  recognizes  the  devilish  spirit 
of  rebellion." 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  245 

The  shuddering  world  today  will  recognize  in  Harper's  rav- 
ing the  insanity  of  hate.  The  history  of  man's  struggle  for  free- 
dom shows  that  rebellions  have  won  for  mankind  all  the  freedom 
they  possess.  Did  ever  any  ruler  on  earth,  of  his  own  will,  loosen 
his  grip  on  the  liberties  of  those  he  ruled?  Every  inch  of  liberty 
the  English-speaking  people  now  have  was  gained  by  rebellions. 
The  colonies  of  '76  won  freedom  by  rebellion.  Rebellion  means 
resistance  to  lawful  rule.  George  III.  was  the  lawful  King  of  the 
Colonies.  At  no  period  in  the  existence  of  this  Union  has  one 
State  or  group  of  States  held  lawful  rule  over  any  other  State  or 
group  of  States.  The  most  stupendous  falsehood  ever  told  on 
this  continent  is  the  falsehood  that  the  Southern  people  rebelled. 
There  can  be  no  rebellion  except  against  lawful  rulers.  The  Re- 
publican party  of  the  6o's  was  guilty  of  the  monstrous  crime  of 
usurping  the  power  to  rule  the  Southern  States.  Not  only  did 
Republicans  pour  out  the  virulence  of  hate  on  the  South's  men, 
her  women  came  in  for  a  share,  and  a  large  share  they  received. 
A  few  specimens  will  show  the  women  of  this  generation  how 
their  mothers  were  hated  in  the  past. 

Harper's  Weekly,  October  12th,  1861,  has  this: 

"The  ladies  of  the  South  ought  to  be  sent  to  the  alms- 
houses and  made  to  nurse  pauper  babies,  and  put  to  wash 
tubs  under  Irish  Biddies." 

In  the  year  1865,  June  4th,  Harper  had  this  little  nugget  of 
pure  hate: 

"The  women  of  the  South  are  lovely  and  accomplished 
to  look  at,  but  their  bold  barbarity  has  de-humanized  them ; 
they  are  like  the  smooth-skinned  wives  and  daughters  of  the 
ogres  in  fairy  tales — hyenas  and  wolves  in  w'oman's  shape." 

The  lies  of  hate  are  not  all  dead  yet;  as  late  as  June,  1894,  a 
little  paper  called  the  Picket  Guard,  run  in  the  interest  of  the 
Grand  Army  of  the  Republic  of  St.  Louis,  published  the  follow- 
ing wanton  falsehood  on  the  w^omen  of  the  South : 

"The  mothers  of  the  South,"  said  the  Picket  Guard, 
"systematically  taught  their  children  to  be  cruel.  During  the 
war  it  was  the  custom  of  Southern  ladies,  accompanied  by 
their  little  boys  and  girls,  to  walk  through  the  prison  hospi- 
tals and  tear  bandages  from  the  wounds  of  the  Union  prison- 
ers, to  exult  in  the  pain  they  witnessed." 

Not  a  paper  in  St.  Louis  denounced  this  hate-born  lie.  On 
the  contrary,  a  Republican  daily  paper,  the  Star,  of  that  city, 


246  .  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  Chap.    32 

reproduced  the  lie  in  its  columns,  as  a  warning  to  the  Society 
of  the  Daughters  of  the  Confederacy  to  keep  silent  on  the  war  of 
the  6o's. 

On  June  8th,  1866,  ^Ir.  Shellabarger  of  Ohio,  from  the  floor 
of  Congress,  poured  out  a  stream  of  hate-born  lies,  of  which  the 
following  is  a  sample: 

"They  (the  people  of  the  South)  framed  iniquity  and 
universal  murder  into  law — their  pirates  burned  your  com- 
merce on  every  sea  (the  South  had  no  pirates).  They  plan- 
ned one  universal  bonfire  of  the  North.  They  murdered  by 
systems  of  starvation  and  exposure  60,000  of  your  sons  in 
their  prisons." 

Of  the  malignant  as  well  as  foolish  lies  in  this  extract,  it 
is  only  necessary  to  notice  the  biggest  of  them  all,  the  assertion 
that  the  South  murdered  60,000  Union  soldiers  in  her  prisons. 
Secretary  of  War  Stanton  left  on  record  the  number  of  men  on 
both  sides  who  were  made  prisoners  during  the  war,  and  the 
number  who  died  in  prison. 

In  Northern  prisons  were  Southern  soldiers.  .  .  .220,000 

Of  those  died  in  Northern  prisons 26,000 

In  the  South's  prisons  wrre  Union  soldiers.  .  .  .270,000 
Of  those  who  died  in  Southern  prisons 23,576 

These  figures  show  that  ]\Ir.  Shellabarger *s  figures  exceed 
Stanton's  by  36,424.  If  only  2^,=,y6  Union  soldiers  died  in  the 
South's  prisons,  how  did  it  happen  that  she  starved  to  death 
60,000  in  her  prisons? 

"And,"  continued  Mr.  Shellabarger,  in  a  final  burst  of 
mendacity,  "to  concentrate  into  one  crime  all  that  is  criminal 
in  crime,  all  that  is  barbarian,  they  (the  people  of  the  South) 
killed  the  President  of  the  United  States." 

Five  days  later  Mr.  Windom  of  Minnesota  undertook  to  rival 
if  not  surpass  Mr.  Shellabarger  in  mendacity.  Standing  on  the 
floor  of  Congress,  Mr.  Windom  spoke  as  follows : 

"The  people  of  the  South  waged  a  diabolical  four-years' 
war ;  they  murdered  our  soldiers  in  cold  blood ;  they  fired  our 
hotels  filled  with  women  and  children ;  they  starved  our  sol- 
diers to  death  in  their  prisons,  within  sight  of  storehouses 
groaning  with  Confederate  supplies.  They  polluted  the 
fountain  of  life.  They  only  laid  down  their  arms  when  our 
victorious  bayonets  were  at  their  throats ;  and,  while  profess- 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  247 

ing  to  accept  the  \ssues  of  the  war,  they  assassinated  the  Na- 
tion's President." 

In  1876,  eleven  years  after  the  South  surrendered,  Mr. 
James  G.  Blaine  of  Maine  stood  up  in  Congress  and  poured 
out  a  lot  of  hate-born  lies  as  malignant  as  human  tongue  ever 
uttered  or  human  brain  ever  concocted : 

"Mr.  Davis,"  cried  Blaine,  "was  the  author,  knowingly, 
deliberately,  guiltily,  and  willfully,  of  the  gigantic  murders 
and  crimes  at  Andersonville.  And  I  here,  before  God,  meas- 
uring my  words,  knowing  their  full  extent  and  import,  de- 
clare that  neither  the  deeds  of  the  Duke  of  Alva  in  the  Low 
Country,  nor  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  nor  the 
thumb-screws  and  other  engines  of  torture  of  the  Spanish 
Inquisition,  began  to  compare  in  atrocity  with  the  hideous 
crimes  of  Andersonville." 

When  his  speech  was  concluded  Mr.  Blaine's  admirers 
rushed  up  to  congratulate  him.  Mr.  B.  H.  Hill  of  Georgia  rose 
to  his  feet  and  confronted  them  with  Stanton's  figures. 

"If,"  said  Mr.  Hill,  "cruelty  killed  the  23.500  Union  sol- 
diers who  died  in  the  South's  prisons,  7vhaf  killed  the  26,000 
Confederate  soldiers  who  died  in  th^  North's  prisons?  In 
other  words,  if  the  nine  per  cent,  of  men  in  the  South's 
prisons  were  starved  and  tortured  to  death  by  ]\Ir.  Jefferson 
Davis.  7(.'ho  tortured  to  death  the  twelve  per  cent,  of  the 
South's  men  who  died  in  the  North's  prisons?" 

Mr.  Blaine  and  his  friends  were  dumfounded.  vStanton  was 
an  authority  whose  figures  they  dared  not  assail ;  they,  as  Shella- 
barger,  had  not  chanced  to  see  Stanton's  figures. 

Mr.  Blaine  made  no  reply  to  Hill  for  several  days.  Finding 
the  figures  had  been  quoted  correctly,  he  did  not  venture  to 
deny  their  accuracy,  but  attempted  to  weaken  their  force ;  he 
had  not  magnanimity  enough  to  admit  an  error,  to  regret  a 
wrong.  His  explanation  was  lame,  but  it  was  the  best  he  could 
frame. 

"Our  men,"  said  Mr.  Blaine,  "when  captured  were  in 
full  health ;  they  came  back  wasted  and  worn.  The  rebel 
prisoners  in  large  numbers  were  emaciated  and  reduced 
from  having  been  ill-fed,  ill-clothed,  so  they  died  rapidly  in 
our  prisons — died  like  sheep." 

This  excuse  was  accepted  by  Republicans,  and  the  lie  that 
the  South  starved  prisoners  to  death  was  kept  alive,  and  to  this 


248  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

day  is  often  told.  In  1892,  B.  F.  Butler,  surnamed  the  Beast, 
wrote  a  book  he  called  "Butler's  Book."  No  one  will  fancy  that 
Butler  would  willingly  speak  one  kind  word  of  man  or  woman 
in  the  South.  Butler  was  a  renegade  from  the  Democratic  party, 
therefore,  like  all  renegades,  hoped  to  win  favor  with  the  party  he 
had  joined  by  villifying  the  party  he  had  abandoned.  Butler 
wrote  his  book  twenty-seven  years  after  the  South  surrendered. 
During  all  those  twenty-seven  years  the  lie  that  Mr.  Davis  had 
willfully  starved  and  tortured  Union  soldiers  to  death  was  told 
and  retold  a  hundred  thousand  times.  All  that  time  Butler  knew 
the  statement  was  false,  but  he  did  not  choose  to  say  so  until  he 
wrote  his  book  in  1892. 

In  that  book,  page  610,  Butler  says : 

"In  the  matter  of  starvation  of  prisoners  the  fact  is  in- 
contestible  that  a  soldier  of  our  army  would  easily  have 
starved  on  the  rations  which  in  the  latter  days  of  the  war 
were  served  out  to  the  Confederate  soldiers  before  Peters- 
burg. I  examined  the  haversacks  of  many  Confederate  sol- 
diers captured  on  picket  during  the  summer  of  1864,  and 
found  therein,  as  their  rations  for  three  days,  scarcely  more 
than  a  pint  of  kernels  of  corn,  none  of  which  were  broken, 
but  only  parched  to  blackness  by  the  camp  fires,  and  a  piece 
of  raw  bacon  about  three  inches  long  by  an  inch  and  a  half 
wide,  and  less  than  half  an  inch  thick.  No  Northern  soldier 
could  have  lived  three  days  on  that.  With  regard  to  cloth- 
ing, it  was  simply  impossible  for  the  Confederates,  at  that 
time  and  months  before,  to  have  any  sufficient  clothing  on  the 
bodies  of  their  own  soldiers.  Many  went  bare-footed  all 
winter.  Necessity  compelled  the  condition  of  food  and 
clothes  given  by  them  to  our  men  in  their  prisons.  It  was 
not  possible  for  the  Confederate  authorities  to  svipply  clothes 
and  food."  — Butler's  Book,  page  610. 

Yet  Windom  had  the  gall  to  assert  that  the  South  starved 
her  prisoners  to  death  within  sight  of  granaries  groaning  with 
Confederate  supplies. 

While  Mr.  Davis  lay  in  a  dungeon  cell  in  Fortress  Monroe, 
and  while  the  whole  air  of  the  North  was  thick  with  the  cries, 
"Hang  him!  Hang  him!  Hang  him!"  a  number  of  the  leading 
men  of  the  Republican  party  consulted  together,  and  decided  to 
settle  the  question  decisively,  was  Davis  guilty,  as  charged,  of 
cruelty  to  the  Union  soldiers  in  prison  ?  Gov.  Jno.  A.  Andrew  of 
Massachusetts,  Horace  Greeley,  Thaddeus  Stevens,  Henry  Wil- 
son, then  Vice-President  of  the  United  States,  and  Gerritt  Smith 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  249 

were  of  the  number  who  were  wilHng  secretly  to  admit  they  did 
not  beHeve  Mr.  Davis  guilty  as  charged — secretly,  not  one  had 
the  fairness  to  say  so  openly.  However,  in  the  first  week  of  Con- 
gress, 1866,  these  men  sent  Chief  Justice  George  Shea  of  the 
Marine  Court  to  Canada  to  inspect  the  official  records  of  the  Con- 
federate Government.  Judge  Shea  saw  General  John  C.  Breck- 
enridge,  then  in  Canada,  and  through  his  influence  was  placed  in 
Judge  Shea's  hands  the  official  records  of  the  Confederate  Gov- 
ernment, which  Judge  Shea  carefully  examined,  especially  all 
the  messages  and  acts  of  the  Executive  and  Senate  in  secret  ses- 
sions, concerning  the  care  and  exchange  of  prisoners.  Judge 
Shea  found  that  the  inhuman  and  unwarlike  treatment  of  the 
South's  soldiers  in  Northern  prisons  was  a  most  prominent  and 
frequent  topic  during  those  secret  sessions.  From  those  docu- 
ments, not  meant  to  meet  the  public  eye,  it  was  manifest  that  the 
people  of  the  South  had  reports  of  the  cruel  treatment  of  their 
loved  ones  in  Northern  prisons,  and  through  representatives  in 
Richmond  had  pressed  Mr.  Davis,  as  the  Executive  and  the  Com- 
mander-in-Chief of  the  South's  Army  and  Navy,  instantly  to  try 
active  measures  of  retaliation,  to  the  end  that  the  cruelties  to 
prisoners  should  be  stopped.  Judge  Shea,  in  his  report  of  the  in- 
vestigation, said: 

"It  was  decisively  manifest  that  Mr.  Davis  steadily  and 
unflinchingly  set  himself  in  opposition  to  the  demands  made 
for  retaliation,  and  this  impaired  his  personal  influence  and 
brought  much  censure  upon  him  from  Southern  people. 
These  secret  sessions  show  that  Mr.  Davis  strongly  desired 
to  do  something  which  would  secure  better  treatment  to  his 
men  in  Northern  prisons,  and  would  place  the  war  on  the 
footing  of  wars  waged  by  people  in  modern  times,  and  divest 
it  of  a  savage  character ;  and  to  this  end  Mr.  Davis  commis- 
sioned Alexander  Stevens,  A^ice-President  of  the  Confedera- 
cy, to  proceed  to  Washington  as  military  commissioner.  This 
project  was  prevented  by  Lincoln  and  Seward,  who  denied 
permission  for  Mr.  Stevens  to  approach  Washington.  After 
this  effort  to  produce  a  mutual  kindness  in  the  treatment  of 
prisoners  failed,  the  Southern  people  became  more  unquiet 
on  the  matter,  yet  the  secret  records  show  that  Mr.  Davis  did 
not  yield  to  the  continual  demand  for  retaliation." 

— Southern  Historical  Papers. 
Although  this  report,  made  in  1866,  completely  exonerated 
Mr.  Davis  from  the  vile  charge  of  having  tortured  and  starved 
prisoners  to  death,  such  was  the  despotism  of  the  party  in  power, 


250  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

such  was  the  bitter  hate  Republicans  in  the  North  felt  toward  the 
South,  this  report  was  not  given  to  the  public  until  nearly  eleven 
years  after  Judge  Shea's  report  was  made.  All  these  eleven 
years  every  Republican  engine,  newspapers,  magazines,  lecturers, 
politicians,  were  hard  at  work  villifying  Mr.  Davis  and  repeat- 
ing the  lie  that  he  was  guilty  of  torturing  and  starving  prisoners 
to  death ;  and  this,  although  Horace  Greeley,  Senator  Wilson, 
Gov.  Jno.  A.  Andrew  of  Massachusetts,  Gerritt  Smith  and  other 
high  Republicans  knew  these  charges  were  absolutely  false.  Was 
this  Shea  investigation  kept  secret  from  Blaiucf  While  in  For- 
tress Monroe  cell,  sick,  feeble,  unable  to  rise  from  his  cot  because 
of  the  iron  shackles  and  heavy  iron  balls  on  his  ankles.  Republican 
cartoonists  were  using  all  the  ingenuity  of  their  art  to  picture  Mr. 
Davis,  not  only  as  contemptibly  weak,  but  as  ferocious  as  a  wild 
beast.  In  the  collection  of  the  New  York  Historical  Society  are 
preserved  a  nvimber  of  these  malignant  productions.  One,  enti- 
tled the  "Confederacy  in  Petticoats,"  shows  Mr.  Davis  dressed  as 
a  poor  old  woman,  feebly  climbing  a  fence  to  escape  the  Union 
soldiers  which  pursue  him  with  pointed  pistols  and  drawn  swords. 
Another  cartoon,  entitled  "Uncle  Sam's  Menagerie,"  shows  Mr. 
Davis  as  a  hyena  in  an  iron  cage  playing  with  a  human  skull.  A 
noose  is  around  his  neck  connected  with  a  high  gallows,  and  the 
rope  about  to  be  drawn  taut.  Above  the  iron  cage,  in  the  shape 
of  birds  perched  on  little  gallows  of  their  own,  each  with  a  noose 
around  his  neck,  are  figures  of  other  Confederate  leaders.  Uncle 
Sam,  in  his  usual  red  and  white  striped  breeches,  acting  the  show- 
man, stands  by  the  iron  cage,  a  long  stick  in  his  hand,  pointing  up 
to  the  gallows. 

In  Toledo,  Ohio,  October,  1879,  fourteen  years  after  the  war 
had  ended,  about  four  thousand  five  hundred  ex-Union  soldiers 
held  a  meeting.  The  object  of  the  meeting,  it  seems,  was  to  vil- 
lify  the  South,  and  especially  to  iterate  and  reiterate  the  lies  that 
Union  soldiers  were  willfully  starved  to  death  in  her  prisons.  A 
man  named  Moody  made  the  welcoming  address.  A  few  extracts 
from  the  different  speeches  will  show  the  spirit  of  hate  that 
ruled  the  crowd: 

"And  now,  ladies  and  gentlemen,"  said  Mr.  Moody,  "in 
behalf  of  the  thousands  that  starved  and  rotted  and  died  in 
the  damnable  hells  controlled  by  that  accursed  traitor,  Jeff 
Davis  (loud  applause),  assisted  by  imps  like  Puppy  Ross, 
Captain  Wertz  and  others ;  in  behalf  of  every  one  that  lies  in 
graves  where  they  were  put  by  traitors,  accursed  traitors,  to 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  251 

their  Government,  the  best  in  the  world ;  in  behalf  of  the  God 
above,  we  thank  you  for  this  grand  reception." 
Col.  Streight  made  a  speech,  in  which  he  said : 

"I  am  called  on  by  Copperheads  (Northern  Democrats) 
to  smoke  the  pipe  of  peace  with  Ben  Hill  of  Georgia,  and 
with  men  who  stand  i:p  in  Congress  and  deny  that  the 
Union  soldiers  had  been  starved  and  tortured  in  their  prisons. 
Men  who  lied  like  traitors,  as  they  are.  to  get  out  of  it,  when 
they  say  rebel  prisoners  were  abused  in  Northern  prisons. 
(Applause).  And  now  Hill  wants  to  smoke  the  pipe  of  peace 
with  me.  He  fills  that  pipe  with  rebel  lies,  with  infamy.  He 
fills  it  with  self-conceit  and  self-glory.  It  makes  me  sick. 
Hill  stands  up  there  in  Congress  and  says  the  rebel  stook 
the  best  care  they  could  of  our  men  in  their  prisons.  He  lies ! 
He  lies  deep  down  in  his  throat !  He  knows  he  lies !  Yet  we 
have  some  persons  in  this  country  anxious  to  forget  and  for- 
give."    (Long  and  loud  applause). 

Garfield  was  a  speaker  at  that  meeting.  Garfield's  speech  and 
Colonel  Streight's  had  been  cast  in  the  same  mould.  The  fol- 
lowing is  an  extract  from  Garfield's  reported  speech : 

"The  Southern  Senators  lie  like  traitors,  as  they  are!" 
shouted  Garfield,  "when  they  say  our  men  were  treated  as 
wx'll  in  their  prisons  as  the  rebels  were  treated  in  our  pris- 
ons. Hill  of  Georgia  stands  up  in  Congress  and  lies  when  he 
says  the  rebel  chiefs  took  as  good  care  of  our  men  in  their 
prisons  as  they  could.  Yes,  deep  down  in  his  throat  he  lies. 
They  were  human  fiends.  Hill  is  a  liar.  There  is  no  peace 
with  rebels!  They  are  very  anxious  to  forget  and  forgive. 
Are  zi'e  to  be  friends  with  traitors?  No!  No!  Never!  We 
have  proof  that  Jefferson  Davis  was  guilty  of  torturing  our 
men  in  his  prisons  to  death !  It  was  his  policy  to  make  idiots 
of  our  men  by  tortures.  Southern  cruelty  never  before  in  all 
the  world  had  its  parallel  for  atrocity.  Never  can  we  for- 
give them !  Never  will  I  be  willing  to  imitate  the  loving  kind- 
ness of  Him  who  plar?ted  the  green  grass  on  the  battle- 
fields." 

And  all  this,  twelve  years  after  Judge  Shea  had  made  his 
report ! 

Garfield  seldom  missed  an  opportunity  to  give  vent  to  his  ani- 
mosity.    In  a  speech  in  Chicago   he  said : 

"Never  will  I  consent  to  shake  hands  with  the  South 
until  she  admits  she  was  wrong,  eternally  wrong,  and  the 
North  was  right,  eternally  right." 


252  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

In  1879  and  1880,  during  the  Garfield  campaign,  Republican 
hate  became  a  howling  insanity.  Judge  Yaples,  in  the  Cincin- 
nati Enquirer  of  1880,  said: 

"Republican  hate  is  grounded  on  the  fact  that  the  people 
of  the  South  will  not  join  the  Republican  party." 

How  could  they  be  expected  to  join  a  party  which,  from  its 
birth,  had  wronged  and  hated  them  ? 

Garfield's  champions  boldly  declared  that  when  he  was  elect- 
ed the  South  would  be  territorialized,  so  that  the  whole  country 
could  be  Africanized,  and  negroes  put  in  rule  over  whites  and 
upheld  by  military  power. 

A  Washington  correspondent  of  the  Louisville  Courier-Jour- 
nal, 1879,  "vvrote  this: 

"At  no  time  since  the  war  has  the  rancor  of  the  Republi- 
can press  been  fiercer  than  it  is  at  this  time.  No  epithet  is 
too  vile  to  be  applied  to  the  people  of  the  South.  They  are 
held  up  as  barbarous  ruffians,  outlaws,  murderers,  thieves. 
The  New  York  Tribune  the  other  day  compared  them  to 
hyenas,  and  begged  pardon  of  those  beasts  for  the  compar- 
ison. The  speeches  of  Conkling,  Blaine,  Edmonds  and  the 
rest  are  pitched  in  the  same  key." 

In  December  of  1883  the  Cincinnati  Commercial  Gazette 
contained  this  gem  of  pure  hate  and  pure  lie : 

"If  the  actual  state  of  things  South  of  the  Ohio  were 
set  before  the  Northern  people  they  would  have  no  sympathy 
to  spare  for  cruelty  in  any  other  part  of  the  world.  No  other 
land  can  furnish  a  parallel  to  such  barbarity  as  our  own. 
From  Zululand  and  Congo,  Ashantee  and  Abysinnia,  through 
the  Nomadic  Bedouins,  the  Bashi  Bazouks,  the  half-civil- 
ized tribes  of  Western  Asia,  to  the  savage  rule  of  the 
Czar,  with  his  endless  procession  of  political  prisoners  to  Si- 
beria, not  one  can  equal  the  reign  of  the  savagery  which 
exists  in  the  South." 

When  this  was  written  the  Southern  people  were  hard 
at  "work  increasing  their  crops,  multiplying  their  industries, 
enlarging  their  school  facilities,  teaching  the  older  and  richer 
portions  of  the  country  lessons  in  manufacturing,  renewing 
the  soil  of  their  fields,  and  offering  the  world  an  example  of 
two  widely  differing  races  living  in  harmony  together." 

A  Republican  paper,  the  Lemars  (Iowa)  Sentinel,  during 
Garfield's  campaign,  said : 


Chap.  32  Facts  anb  Falsehoods.  253 

"On  the  Fourth  of  July,  1881,  the  pig-headed  brigadiers 
of  Massasip  and  Kaintuck,  Arkansas,  Alabam,  and  the 
whole  barbarian  Southland,  will  see  their  State  Constitutions, 
and  State  sovereignties,  and  State  lines,  their  ignorance  and 
tlieir  cowardice,  torn  up  by  the  roots  from  their  blood-soaked 
soil.  Garfield's  Presidency  is  to  be  the  Regency  of  Stalwart- 
ism  ;  after  that — Rex." 

During  Mr.  Hayes'  campaign,  Mr.  Howard  Kutchins,  editor 
of  the  Fon-du-lac  (Wis.)  Conuiioiiwcalth,  two  weeks  before 
election  day  inserted  in  his  paper  the  following  address  to  Repub- 
lican voters : 

"To  Anus,  Republicans!" 
"Men  ?  Work  in  every  town  in  Wisconsin  for  men  not 
afraid  of  fire-arms,  of  blood,  or  dead  bodies.  To  preserve 
peace  and  prevent  the  administration  of  public  affairs  from 
falling  into  the  hands  of  obnoxious  men,  every  Republican  in 
Wisconsin  should  go  armed  to  the  polls  on  next  election 
day.  The  grain  stacks,  houses  and  barns  of  all  active  Demo- 
crats should  be  burned  to  the  ground,  their  children  burned 
with  them,  their  wives  outraged,  that  they  may  understand 
the  Republican  party  is  the  one  which  is  bound  to  rule,  and 
the  one  which  they  should  vote  for  or  keep  their  stinking  car- 
casses away  from  the  polls.  If  they  persist  in  going  to  the 
polls  and  voting  for  Jenkins  (Democrat),  meet  them  on  the 
road,  in  the  bush,  on  the  hill,  anywhere,  night  or  day,  and 
shoot  every  one  of  the  base  cowards  and  agitators.  If  they 
are  too  strong  in  any  locality  and  succeed  in  putting  their 
opposition  votes  into  the  ballot  boxes,  break  open  the  boxes, 
tear  to  shreds  their  discord-breeding  ballots,  and  burn  them 
to  ashes.  This  is  the  time  for  effective  work.  These  agita- 
tors must  be  put  down.  Whoever  opposes  us  does  so  at  his 
peril.  Republicans,  be  at  the  polls  in  accordance  with  the 
above  directions,  and  do  not  stop  for  a  little  blood." 

Hayes  became  President ;  in  reward  for  so  much  party  zeal 
he  nominated  the  bloodthirsty  Kutchins  for  the  Internal  Revenue 
Collectorship  in  the  Third  District  of  Wisconsin.  vSo  far  as  I  can 
learn,  not  a  man  or  woman  in  the  Republican  party  made  any  ob- 
•  jection  to  Kutchins'  savage  advice  to  voters.  Yet  this  is  the  party 
which  to  this  day  weeps  tears  of  sympathy  over  any  negro  man 
whose  vote  is  not  cast  and  counted  in  the  South. 

It  seems  that  Mr.  Wendell  Phillips  never  fully  recovered 
from  the  gangrene  of  heart  caused  by  the  fumes  of  blood  continu- 
ally rising  from  battlefields.  An  article  by  him  in  the  American 


254  Facts  anet  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

Rez'iezi'  of  ]\Iarch,  1879,  shows  that  a  wolf's,  not  a  human,  heart 
still  ramped  in  his  breast. 

"Treason,"  wrote  Phillips,  "should  have  been  punished 
more  severely.  We  all  now  see  that  magnanimity  went  as  far 
as  it  safely  could  when  it  granted  the  traitor  his  life.  His 
land  should  have  been  taken  from  him,  and  before  Andrew 
Johnson's  treachery,  every  traitor  would  have  been  too  glad 
to  be  let  off  so  easily.  His  land  should  have  been  divided 
among  the  negroes,  forty  acres  to  each  family.  Every 
rebel  State  should  have  been  held  as  a  territory  under  the 
direct  rule  of  the  Government,  without  troublesome  ques- 
tions. Henry  Wilson,  Vice-President,  confessed  to  me  that 
this  was  the  greatest  mistake  of  our  party.  His  excuse  for 
the  mistake  was  that  the  Republican  party  did  not  dare  to 
risk  any  other  course  in  the  face  of  Democratic  opposition." 

Only  a  heart  gangrened  with  hate,  only  a  judgment  distorted 
by  hate,  could  call  the  South's  resistance  to  invasion  treason.  Be- 
fore hate-insanity  got  in  its  work  on  Phillips'  brain  he  declared 
that  the  South  acted  on  the  principles  of  'y6.  and  that  no  one 
standing  with  these  principles  behind  him  could  deny  the  South's 
right  to  independence.  The  smallest  affairs  of  life  Republicans 
slimed  all  over  with  the  poison  of  hate. 

Articles  like  the  following  adorned  Republican  newspapers. 
The  Topeka  (Kansas)  Citizen,  a  Republican  paper,  in  1879  had 
this : 

"By  allowing  the  worthless  scoundrels  of  the  South  to 
live,  their  contemptible  seed  was  perpetuated.  They  are  a  set 
of  demons,  both  by  nature  and  practice,  and  Avhile  one  of  the 
breed  is  left  they  will  remain  the  same.  As  well  try  to  hatch 
chickens  from  snake  eggs  as  to  raise  a  decent  race  of  human 
beings  from  the  ofTscouring  of  the  miserable,  heartless  mur- 
derers and  robbers  of  the  South." 
A  Chicago  paper  had  this : 

"In  their  houses,  their  persons,  their  food,  their  habits, 
Southern  men  and  women,  as  a  rule,  are  unclean.  They  have 
dogs  and  hogs  and  other  unclean  animals  for  their  nearest 
neighbors,  and  share  their  houses  with  these  animals  and 
vermin  of  a  different  sort." 

Another  Chicago  paper  kindly  served  notice  as  follows: 
"When  Southern  men  come  North,  whether  for  busi- 
ness or  pleasure,  they  must  understand  they  will  not  be  re- 
ceived as  equals." 


Chap.  32  Facts  axd  Falsehoods.  255 

Robert  Ingersoll,  the  favorite  infidel  lecturer  of  the  Repub- 
lican party,  made  loud  pretense  of  loving  liberty.  The  follow- 
ing is  a  sample  of  the  kind  of  liberty  Ingersoll  lived : 

"When  a  man,"  said  Ingersoll,  "talks  of  despotism  you 
may  be  sure  he  wants  to  steal,  or  be  up  to  some  devilment. 
/  am  not  afraid  of  centralization ;  /  want  the  power  where 
somebody  can  use  it.  I  want  the  ear  of  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment acute  enough,  its  arms  long  enough,  to  reach  a  man 
in  any  State." 

In  1879  the  Quincy  (Illinois)   Whig  had  this: 

"Every  Republican  knows  that  nothing  so  good  could 
happen  to  this  country,  nothing  that  would  be  of  such  advan- 
tage, as  a  general  and  judicious  slaughter  of  Democrats  at 
the  polls.  Every  Republican  ought  to  take  a  bayonet  to  the 
polls  for  the  purpose  of  assisting  the  Federal  army  in  the 
work  of  killing  the  Democrats." 

The  reader  must  never  forget  that  all  the  hate  Republicans 
felt  originated  in  hate  of  Democrats.  Hate  of  Thomas  Jef- 
ferson's principles  is  as  inherent  and  ineradicable  in  Republican 
hearts  as  it  is  in  the  open  and  avowed  monarchists. 

In  1879  the  Lemars  (Iowa)  Sentinel,  a  true-blue  Republican 
paper,  published  in  its  columns  Republican  opinions  of  Southern 
people  as  follows : 

"The  South  is  not  and  never  was  aught  else  but  pusil- 
lanimous, perfidious,  cowardly.  We  ask,  nay  challenge,  all 
the  Brigadiers  in  Yah-Hoo  land  (the  South)  to  show  one  in- 
stance, one  solitary  instance  in  all  her  history,  of  either  honor 
or  courage.  We  could  fill  the  Sentinel  ten  thousand  times 
with  deeds  of  Southern  infamy,  treachery,  blood-thirstiness, 
mendacity,  malevolence,  barbarity,  ingratitude,  ruflianism, 
dishonor,  cowardice,  rapine,  and  general  hellishness.  That 
so  infamous,  base,  sinister,  indecent,  corrupt,  and  demoni- 
acal people  should  ever  have  enjoyed  the  reputation  of  chiv- 
alry or  of  courage,  is  bad  enough,  but  that  such  spawns  of 
hell  should  be  rehabilitated  with  political  rights,  and  made 
political  equals  of  the  brave,  loyal,  true  Xorthern  men,  is  the 
champion  crime  of  the  Nineteenth  Century." 

Brevet  ]\Iajor  George  W.  Nichols,  aide-de-camp  to  General 
Sherman  when  he  made  that  vainglorious  march  to  the  sea, 
wrote  a  book  called  "The  Story  of  the  Great  March."  Hate  so 
warped  Major  Nichols'  mind  he  made  statements  so  absurd  no 


256  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

one   outside   of   imbecile   asylums    could   possibly   believe    them. 
Instance  this  from  page  173: 

"A  characteristic  feature  of  South  Carolina  has  im- 
pressed itself  upon  all  of  us.  I  refer  to  the  zvliining,  helpless, 
craven  spirit  of  the  men.  These  fellows  are  more  cowardly 
than  children ;  they  whine  like  whipped  boys.  There  is  not 
an  officer  or  soldier  in  all  our  army  wdio  does  not  feel  the 
most  supreme  disgust  and  contempt  for  those  chivalric 
creatures." 

On  page  193    Major  Nichols  has  this: 

"The  white  people  of  South  Carolina  are  among  the 
most  degraded  specimens  of  humanity  I  ever  saw — lazy, 
shiftless ;  only  energy  to  whine.  The  higher  classes  in  South 
Carolina  represents  the  scum,  the  lower,  the  dregs  of  civ- 
ilization. They  are  not  Americans ;  they  are  merely  South 
Carolinians." 

On  page  213    is  this: 

"What  strikes  me  most  is  the  evidence  of  intellectual 
decay.  They  so  want  in  energy  and  vitality  as  to  approach 
senility." 

The  imbecility  of  North  Carolina's  people  did  not  escape 
this  sharp-sighted  Major.  On  page  293  he  tells  of  his  visit  to 
an  insane  asylum : 

"I  found,"  said  the  Major,  "that  the  inmates  were  more 
idiotic  than  insane.  The  only  inmate  zvho  gave  evidence  of 
ever  having  intellect  zvas  a  man  from  Massachusetts." 

So  completely  did  the  devilish  spirit  of  hate  dominate  the 
hearts  and  brains  of  Sherman  and  his  officers,  they  had  not  as 
much  kind  feeling  for  the  unfortunate  women  living  on  the  line 
of  that  march  as  humane  men  would  have  felt  for  dumb  cattle. 
The  divine  quality  of  mercy,  of  pity,  had  no  lodgment  in  their 
breasts.  Major  Nichols'  book  proves  this.  Soon  after_  entering 
Atlanta,  Ga.,  Sherman  ordered  every  inhabitant  (fifteen  thou- 
sand in  number)  driven  from  the  city.  Not  a  single  armed  man 
was  among  them  ;  they  w'ere  mostly  v/o'iien  and  children,  with  a 
few  old  men.  Of  this  unnecessary  mea5"re,  Major  Nichols  says: 
"The  order  was  firmly  but  kindly  executed.  They 
were  allozved  to  choose  zvhich  zvay  to  go." 

Was  it  this  allowance  that  constituted  the  kindness?  Think 
of  it,  Christian  people!  15,000  women  and  children,  at  the  point 
of  bayonets,  driven  from  their  homes  into  the  pathless  woods,  in 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  257 

the  bleak  November  montli,  shelterless,  foodless,  to  wander  about 
as  they  might.  In  his  report  of  this  to  General  Halleck,  Sher- 
man says : 

"They  (the  women  and  children)  did  not  suiter,  unless 
for  'want  of  food." 

Picture  to  yourselves,  Christian  people  of  this  age,  the  suf- 
fering of  15,000  women  and  children  in  such  a  condition!  Of 
this  act   General  J.  B.  Hood  wrote  Sherman: 

"Your  unprecedented  measure  transcends  in  studied 
and  ingenious,  cruelty  all  acts  ever  before  brought  to  my  at- 
tention in  the  dark  history  of  war." 

Hood's  letter  greatly  angered  the  irascible  and  self-inflated 
Sherman,  who  wrote  to  Halleck: 

'T  cannot  tamely  submit  to  such  impertinence.  But  as 
long  as  my  Government  is  satisfied  I  do  not  care  what  rebels 
say." 

Sherman's  Government  was  highh-  satisfied.  Every  act  of 
cruelty  to  Southern  people  greatly  pleased  that  cruel  and  pitiless 
government.  Had  Sherman  ordered  the  women  of  Atlanta  to 
be  prodded  by  bayonets  out  of  their  homes,  along  their  streets 
bleeding,  fainting,  to  the  woods,  or  had  he  ordered  them  hanged 
by  the  dozens  until  dead  on  the  boughs  of  the  trees,  that  govern- 
ment would  have  been  fully  as  well  pleased.  There  is  nothing  in 
the  history  of  that  government  to  show  that  it  ever  manifested  the 
slightest  disapprobation  of  the  atrocities  its  armies  perpetrated. 
After  Atlanta  was  empty  of  its  citizens,  every  woman  and  child 
in  the  woods,  Major  Nichols  cheerfully  informs  us  that — 

"The  soldiers  are  now  resting  and  enjoying  themselves 

thoroughly." 

Resting  from  the  labor  of  driving  women  and  children  out 
of  their  homes  into  the  woods,  and  enjoying  themselves  over 
the  suffering  caused.  After  resting  the  soldiers  were  ordered  to 
burn  down  the  city.     Major  Nichols  savs: 


<<' 


'The  houses  are  now  all  vacant.  The  streets  are  empty. 
A  terrible  stillness  and  solitude  depresses  even  those  who 
are  glad  to  destroy  all.  In  the  gardens  beautiful  roses 
bloom,  the  homes  are  all  in  flames.  In  the  peaceful  homes 
of  the  North  there  can  be  no  conception  how  these  people 
suffer  for  their  crimes." 


258  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap. 


32 


What  crimes?  Only  hate-poisoned  hearts,  only  hate- 
distorted  brains  could  or  can  call  a  war  of  defense  a  crime.  Re- 
member, oh  posterity,  from  the  first  to  the  last  of  the  war,  the 
South  fought  in  self-defense.  The  Republican  party  fought  a 
war  of  conquest. 

On  page  37    Major  Nichols  says: 

"We  are  leaving  Atlanta.  Behind  we  leave  a  track 
of  smoke  and  flame.  Yesterday  we  saw  in  the  distance 
pillows  of  smoke ;  the  bridges  were  all  in  flames.  'I  say !' 
said  a  soldier,  'I  believe  Sherman  has  set  the  very  river 
on  fire.'  Tf  he  has,  its  all  right,'  replied  his  comrade. 
The  rebel  inliabitants  are  in  an  agO)iy.  The  soldiers  are 
as  hearty  and  jolly  as  men  can  be." 

All  through  his  book  Major  Nicliols  seems  to  be  anxious 
to  show  that  the  greater  the  sufferings  inflicted  on  Southern 
people,  the  healthier  and  jollier  were  his  soldiers.  On  page  38 
Major  Nichols  made  the  following  record:. 

"Atlanta.     Night  of  the  15th  of  November,  1864. 

"A  grand  and  awful  spectacle  is  presented  to  the  behold- 
ers of  this  beautiful  city  now  in  flames.  The  Heaven  is 
one  expanse  of  lurid  fire.  The  air  is  filled  with  flying,  burn- 
ing cinders.  Buildings  covering  200  acres  are  in  ruins  or 
in  flames." 

For  2,000  years  the  name  of  Nero  has  been  execrated  as 
that  of  a  monster.  The  burning  of  Rome  was  the  work  of  a  moral 
monster.  Sherman's  crime  of  burning  Atlanta  proves  him  to 
have  been  the  greater  monster  of  the  two,  inasmuch  as  Sherman 
had  been  born  and  reared  under  the  merciful  light  of  Christianity. 
Nero  was  descended  from  a  line  of  pagan  ancestry  on  which 
the  divine  light  of  Christ's  teachifigs  had  never  fallen. 

On  page  39  is  a  picture  of  Atlanta  in  ruins.  On  page  112 
is  a  picture  which  should  today,  thirty-eight  years  after  that  war 
ended,  bring  the  blush  of  shame  to  every  Republican  cheek.  This 
picture  represents  a  little  cottage  on  the  wayside  of  Sherman's 
march.  In  the  open  door  stands  a  sorrowful  woman,  a  babe  in 
her  arms ;  four  frightened  children  clingy  to  her  skirt.  Nine 
or  ten  men  in  blue  are  in  the  yard  prodding  the  earth  with  bayo- 
nets and  sabres  in  search  of  the  little  trifles,  trinkets,  the  sorrow- 
ful woman  had  hoped  to  save  from  army  robbers  by  burying  in 
the  ground.     Of  scenes  like  this  Major  Nichols  says: 

"It   is   possible   that   some   property   thus   hidden   may 


CiiAr.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  259 

have  escaped  the  keen  search  of  our  men,  but  if  so  it  was  not 

for  want  of  diligent  exploration.  With  untiring  zeal  the  sol- 
diers hunted  the  concealed  things  whenever  the  army  halted. 
Almost  every  inch  of  ground  in  the  vicinity  of  the  dwellings 
was  prodded  by  ramrods,  pierced  by  sabres,  upturned  by 
spades.  The  result  was  very  distressing  to  rebel  women 
who  saw  their  little  properties  taken." 

What  can  be  more  contemptible  than  this?  Armed  men, 
officers  and  privates,  robbing  hel])lcss,  poverty-stricken  women 
of  the  poor  little  trinkets  they  had  hoped  to  save  by  burying  in 
the  ground !  And  these  contemptible  deeds  are  related  in  a 
boasting  way! 

"It  was  comical,"  continued  our  fine  Major,  "to  see  a 
group  of  these  veterans  punching  the  unoffending  earth. 
When  they  'struck  a  vein'  the  coveted  wealth  was  speedily 
tmearthed.  Nothing  escaped  the  observation  of  these  sharp- 
witted  soldiers.  I'he  woman  watching  these  proceedings 
was  closely  watched,  her  face,  her  movements,  giving  the  men 
a  clue." 

"These  searches,"  cheerfully  remarks  the  Major,  "made 
one  of  the  pleasant  excitements  of  oar  march." 

Yes,  one;  but  by  no  means  the  only  one.  Robbing  the  women 
of  rings,  pins,  silver  cups,  looting  their  houses,  carrying  off  all 
they  could ;  destroying  what  they  could  not  appropriate,  im- 
mensely added  to  the  "pleasant  excitements  of  that  march." 
Even  the  poor  little  garments,  which  expectant  mothers,  with 
patient  toil,  carding,  spinning  the  thread,  weaving  the  cloth, 
cutting  and  sewing,  had  prepared  for  unborn  babes,  even  these 
poor  little  things  were  seized  by  rude  hands,  held  up  to  the  rude 
jokes  and  laughter  of  the  jubilant  men  in  blue,  then  torn  into 
strips,  thrown  on  the  ground  and  trampled  under   foot. 

So  useless  as  a  military  measure  was  this  vainglorious 
march  of  Sherman's,  even  Union  officers  (General  Piatt  for  one) 
condemn  that  march.  Piatt  says:  "Sherman  could  just  as  well 
have  disbanded  his  army  (60,000  strong)  as  have  been  guilty 
of  the  folly  of  that  march." 

On  page  207  of  Major  Nichols'  book,  I  take  the  following: 

"It  was  usual  to  Jiear  among  soldiers  conversations  like 
this:      'Where  did  you  get  that  splendid  meerschaum?'    or 
'Where  did  you   get  that  fine  cameo?' 

'Oh,'  was  the  reply,  'a  lady  presented  me  this  for  saving 
her  house  from  bdng  burned,'  " 


26o  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

The  wit  of  this  Hes  in  the  fact  that  the  trinkets  had  been 
taken  from  the  ladies  and  their  houses  burned  also. 

"This  style  of  answer,"  comments  our  valiant  Major, 
"became  the  common  explanation  of  the  possession  of  all 
sorts  of  property.  An  officer  taking  a  punch  from  an  ele- 
gant chased  silver  cup,  was  saluted  thus : 

"  'Hello,  Captain !  that's  a  gem  of  a  cup ;  where  did  you  get 
it?'  'Oh,'  returned  the  Captain,  'this  was  given  me  by  a 
lady  for  saving  her  household  things  from  burning  up.'  An 
enterprising  officer  came  into  camp  one  day  with  a  family 
coach  filled  with  hams,  flour,  and  other  things,  and  cried  out, 
'Elegant  carriage,  isn't  it?  This  is  a  gift  from  a  lady  whose 
house  was  in  flames.'  " 

Set  in  flames  by  the  order  of  the  officer  who  had  the  car- 
riage. 

"Gold  watches,  boxes,  chains,  rings,  etc.,  were  got  in 
this  way." 

"This,"  complacently  remarks  our  Major,  "was  one  of 
the  humors  of  the  camp." 

What  do  the  people  of  this  age  think  of  such  humor?  These 
men  in  blue  first  robbed  defenseless  women  of  their  small  trinkets 
and  other  little  things,  set  fire  to  their  houses,  then  lied  to  their 
comrades,  saying  the  trinkets  had  been  presented  to  them  by  the 
women  they  had  robbed.  What  devilish  humor  was  this?  Ma- 
jor Nichols,  page  161,  says: 

"The  Mayor  of  Columbia,  S.  C,  came  out  to  surrender 
the  city,  but  this  did  not  entitle  its  citizens  to  protection." 

Who  could  expect  protection  from  men  whose  hearts  were 
as  devoid  of  mercy,  of  pity,  of  kindness,  as  wolves  or  tigers? 
These  only  rend  and  kill  to  satisfy  the  keen  pangs  of  hunger ;  the 
men  on  that  march  pillaged,  robbed  and  burned  to  satisfy  the 
devilish  demands  of  hate. 

After  descanting  on  the  beauty  of  Columbia,  its  flowering 
vines  and  shrubs,  its  gardens  of  roses  and  fragrant  flowers,  the 
Major  sagely  and  solemnly  says: 

"I  could  but  reflect  on  how  utterly  these  cowardly 
South  Carolinians  have  lost  all  pride'  of  nationality." 

If  the  Republican  party,  its  officers  and  armies  of  the  6o's 
represented  the  real  nationality  of  this  country  in  that  time,  for- 
ever and  forever  would  that  false,  unjust,  cruel  and  blood-soakf 


Chap.  32  •   Facts  and  Falsehoods.  261 

ed    nationality   be   detested,    despised,    scorned,    hated    by    every 
humane  and   freedom-loving  heart   in   America ! 

As  the  reader  knows  (from  evidence  given  in  preceding 
pages  of  this  book),  the  large  majority  of  the  Northern  people 
disliked  and  opposed  Lincoln's  war  of  conquest  on  the  South. 
From  the  first  to  the  last  day  of  that  war  they  opposed  it.  Nich- 
ols is  fond  of  telling  falsehoods  which  only  idiots  could  accept 
as  truths.     Instance  this : 

"The  failure  of  Jef¥  Davis  has  brought  down  on  him  the 
hatred  and  abuse  of  his  own  people.     Were  he  here  today   noth- 
ing but  execration  would  have  been  showered  upon  him." 
And  this : 

"The  people  of  Raleigh,  N.  C,  were  astonished  to  find 
that  Sherman's  army  were  Christian  gentlemen." 

Is  it  possible  that  Major  Nichols  himself  for  one  moment 
believed  Sherman's  army  were  Christian  gentlemen?  Would 
any  "gentleman/'  Christian  or  not,  have  engaged  in  the  mean 
work  of  robbing  poor  women  of  their  small  trinkets,  the  gifts 
of  love  or  friendship?  Would  any  man  with  one  particle  of  gen- 
tlemanly feeling  have  manifested  so  much  pleasure  in  the  suffer- 
ings their  cruelties  caused.  Both  Major  Nichols  and  General 
Sherman  gleefully  parade  their  wanton  wickedness,  and  gleefully 
wind  up  such  stories  by  boasting  of  their  soldiers'  great  enjoy- 
ment of  such  work.     Nichols  says : 

"History  will  in  vain  be  searched  for  a  parallel  to  the 
scathing  and  destructive  effect  of  the  invasion  of  the  Caroli- 
nas.  Aside  from  the  destruction  of  military  things,  there 
were  destructions  overwhelming,  overleaping  the  present 
generation — even  if  peace  speedily  come,  agriculture,  com- 
merce cannot  be  revived  in  our  day.  Day  by  day  our  legions 
of  armed  men  surged  over  the  land,  over  a  region  forty 
miles  wide,  burning  everything  we  could  not  take  away.  On 
every  side,  the  head,  center  and  rear  of  our  columns  might 
be  traced  by  columns  of  smoke  by  day  and  the  glare  of  flames 
by  night.  The  burning  hand  of  war  pressed  on  these  people, 
blasting,  withering." 

In  Sherman's  report  to  Halleck  he  evidently  takes  great 
pride  in  the  wanton  destruction  he  has  wrought: 

"I  estimate,"  writes  Sherman,  "that  the  damage  to 
Georgia  alone  is  $100,000,000 — $98,000,000  was  simple  de- 
ftruction — two  millions  have  inured  to  our  advantage.    Our 


262  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

soldiers  have  done  the  work  zvith  alacrity  and  cheerfulness 
unsurpassed." 

In  Sherman's  report  to  Halleck  of  the  burning  of  Columbia, 
in  1865,  Sherman  charged  that  crime  to  General  Wade  Hampton. 
That  lie  went  traveling  over  the  Northern  States  for  ten  years. 
In  1875,  Appleton  &  Co.  published  Sherman's  Memoirs,  written 
by  himself.  In  volume  2,  page  287,  Sherman,  without  a  blush  of 
shame,  admits  the  lie,  using  the  following  words: 

"In  my  official  report  of  the  conflagration  of  Columbia, 
I  distinctly  charged  it  to  General  Wade  Hampton,  and 
confess  I  did  so  pointedly  to  shake  the  faith  of  his  people 
in  him." 

What  an  old  silly  Sherman  must  have  been  to  think  anything 
he  could  say  on  any  subject  would  shake  any  Southern  man's 
faith  one  way  or  the  other!  Sherman's  sense  of  honor  was  too 
dull  to  permit  his  feeling  ashamed  of  lying,  ashamed  of  publicly 
proclaiming  he  had  lied  on  an  honorable  man,  and  from  the  mean 
motive  of  injuring  him  in  the  esteem  of  his  friends. 

Shortly  after  the  South  surrendered,  Salmon  P.  Chase,  Lin- 
coln's Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  made  a  flying  visit  down  the 
Atlantic  States.  On  his  return,  newspapers  reported  Mr.  Chase's 
opinion  of  the  whites  and  blacks  in  these  States : 

'T  found,"  said  Chase,  "the  whites  a  worn-out,  effete 
race,  without  vigor,  mental  or  physical.  On  the  contrary, 
negroes  are  alive,  alert,  full  of  energy.  /  predict  in  tzventy- 
five  years  the  negroes  of  the  South  zvill  he  at  the  head  of  all 
affairs,  political,  religious,  the.  arts  and  sciences." 

Though  an  undisputed  and  indisputable  fact  that  Guiteau, 
who  assassinated  Garfield,  was  a  Northern  man,  a  member  of  the 
Republican  party,  such  was  the  New  York  Tribune's  blind  and 
bitter  hate  of  the  South,  it  promptly  accused  her  people  of  that 
crime. 

The  Republican  paper,  the  I>emars  (Iowa)  Sentinel,  was  so 
filled  with  the  imperial  spirit  during  the  Hayes  administra- 
tion, it  addressed  that  mild  President  in  the  following  rampant 
style : 

"Rutherford!  are  you  a  man?  If  you  are,  issue  a  proc- 
lamation !  Proclaim  the  States  of  Mississippi  and  Louis- 
iana in  open  rebellion  against  the  Nation!  Declare  every 
State  of  the  old  Rebel  Confederacy  in  a  state  of  siege.  Call 
an  extra  session  of  Congress,  exclude  every  so-called  Sena- 


Chap.  32  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  263 

tor  and  Representative  from  the  rebellious  territory,  and 
with  a  loyal  legislature  begin  the  great  work  of  moulding  a 
plastic  Nation  into  form.  Disfranchise  the  rebel  States  for 
a  generation,  at  least.  This  is  the  heroic  method  and  re- 
quires a  hero  in  the  van." 

If  there  is  anyone  in  the  North  or  the  South  who  believes  this 
strange  hatred  of  Southern  people  has  died  out,  let  him  look  over 
the  columns  of  modern  daily  papers,  let  him  observe  the  tone  of 
modern  Republican  politicians ;  especially  let  him  take  a  glance 
at  modern  Republican  histories,  biographies,  lectures,  etc. 

On  this  day,  October  14,  1903,  a  telegram  from  Louisville, 
Ky.,  states  that  the  members  of  the  Union  Veterans  Union,  at  a 
public  reception  given  them  in  a  large  hall  in  that  city,  sung 
"We'll  Hang  Jeff  Davis  on  a  Sour  Apple  Tree."  Next  day  a 
delegate  offered  a  resolution  disclaiming  any  intention  to  wound 
the  feelings  of  Southerners  by  singing  that  song.  The  resolution 
was  voted  down. 

A  few  years  ago  a  convention  of  educators  met  in  Nashville, 
Tennessee.  The  delegates  were  hospitably  received  and  enter- 
tained, free  of  cost  to  them.  One  of  these  delegates,  a  woman, 
from  the  State  of  Kansas,  was  entertained  in  the  best  hotel  in  the 
city.  While  occupying  an  elegant  room,  eating  and  drinking  of 
the  best  the  State  afforded,  this  woman  wrote  a  letter  for  publica- 
tion to  one  of  her  own  State's  newspapers.  The  Kansas  paper 
promptly  published  it,  and  the  Nashville  American  reproduced  it 
before  the  writer  left  the  city  and  the  people  she  so  hated.  That 
woman  delegate's  malignant  hatred  of  the  South  found  vent  in 
the  following  sentiment : 

"I  hope  and  pray  when  I  pass  away  from  earth  I  will 
be  able  to  look  down  from  the  heavenly  blue  above  and  see 
the  black  heel  set  on  the  white  necks  of  these  people." 

As  a  sample  of  the  way  Republican  writers  do  not  hesitate 
to  tell  untruths,  I  give  a  few  lines  from  a  little  history  published 
in  1894,  written  by  a  woman  named  Mrs.  Emma  Cheney.  Speak- 
ing of  the  attempt  to  reinforce  Fort  Sumter,  Mrs.  Cheney  says : 

"The  rebels  had  meant  to  starve  the  little  garrison  out 
of  Fort  Sumter." 

This  is  not  only  untruthful,  it  is  ungrateful.  Every  day  the 
people  of  Charleston  sent  to  Sumter  a  boat  load  of  food  supplies, 
fresh  meat,  fowls,  fruits,  vegetables,  etc. 

"After  Lee's   surrender,"   says    Mrs.    Emma    Cheney, 


264  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     32 

"Jefferson  Davis  lived  in  a  box  car  because  no  man  honored 
him  enough  to  give  him  hospitality." 

This  is  pure  fiction.  There  was  not  a  man  in  the  South  who 
would  not  have  felt  honored  by  having  Mr.  Davis  a  guest  in  his 
house.  There  was  not  a  woman  who  would  not  willingly  have 
knelt  at  his  feet  and  reverently  kissed  his  hand  in  recognition  of 
his  high  and  lofty  character,  as  well  as  with  deep  and  tender 
affection  and  sympathy  for  the  man  on  whose  pure  and  stainless 
name  so  much  malignancy  had  been  poured  by  his  unworthy 
enemies. 

Mrs,  Emma  Cheney  says: 

"Davis  disguised  himself  as  a  woman  and  carried  a  tin 
pail." 

This  also  is  pure  fiction ;  but  what  if  he  had  disguised  him- 
self as  a  woman?  A  claimant  to  the  English  crown,  when  hunt- 
ed by  his  enemies,  disguised  himself  in  a  woman's  garments.  As 
he  was  going  to  Washington  City,  Lincoln  disguised  himself,  and 
yet  there  was  no  danger  except  what  his  own  imagination  con- 
jured up. 

As  late  as  1902,  thirty-seven  years  after  the  war  ended,  a 
life  of  Abraham  Lincoln  was  published  in  Chicago,  which  re- 
produces, as  facts,  many  malignant  lies  which  have  not  even  a 
shadow  of  truth  to  rest  on.    Instance  the  following,  on  page  798 : 

"The  assassination  of  Abraham  Lincoln  w^as  the  culmi- 
nation of  a  series  of  fiendish  schemes  in  aid  of  an  infamous 
rebellion.  It  was  the  deadly  flower  of  the  rank  and  poison- 
ous weed  of  treason.  The  guiding  2nd  impelling  spirit  of 
secession  nerved  and  aimed  the  blow  struck  by  the  cowardly 


assassin." 


On  page  799  is  this : 

"The  conspiracy  (to  assassinate  Lincoln)  was  clearly 
traceable  to  a  higher  source  than  Booth  and  his  wretched 
accomplices.  In  the  course  of  the  trial  positive  evidence 
was  furnished  connecting  Jacob  Thompson,  Jefferson  Davis 
and  their  associates  with  President  Lincoln's  assassination. 
This  direct  evidence  is  only  the  keystone  of  an  arch  of  cir- 
cumstances strong  as  adamant." 

On  page  802  is  the  following : 

"They  (the  Southern  men)  had  taken  a  form  congenial 
to  their  'chivalrous'  interests,  instigating  and  aiding  piratical 


Chap.  33  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  265 

seizure  on  Lake  Erie,  robbing  a  St.  Alban's  hotel,  burning 
and  wholesale  murder  at  New  York,  and  in  broadcast  diffu- 
sion of  pestilence  and  death  throughout  Northern  cities.  Dr. 
Blackburn  assiduously  labored  to  spread  malignant  diseases. 
What  further  depth  of  iniquity  needed  these  men  before  or- 
ganizing the  conspiracy  to  kill  Mr.  Lincoln?  That  they  did 
enter  the  scheme  is  proved  beyond  a  doubt.  That  Jeffer- 
son Davis,  in  whose  confidential  employment  all  this  while 
they  were,  was  consulted  as  to  the  plan  of  assassination,  and 
gave  it  his  approval,  is  shown  by  direct  testimony." 

On  page  803    is  the  following: 

"The  expedient  of  assassination  of  Mr.  Lincoln  had 
long  been  a  favorite  one,  beyond  doubt,  with  many  of  the 
Southern  traitors." 

On  page  806  is  this : 

"The  assassination  was  not  the  freak  of  a  madcap  or  a 
fanatic ;  it  was  the  natural  outgrowth  of  the  spirit  which  led 
to  rebellion.  The  barbarous  and  upstart  autocrat  who  had 
deliberately  starved  thousands  of  Union  prisoners  could 
have  no  compunction  at  seeing  a  chosen  emissary  stealthily 
murder  the  ruler  of  the  Nation." 

As  long  as  such  lies  are  told  it  is  criminal  for  the  South  to 
remain  silent. 

CHAPTER  XXXIIL 
New  England's  Two  Insanities. 

We  cannot  close  this  work  without  some  special  notice  of  the 
singular  mental  malady  New  England  brought  upon  herself,  and 
which,  being  contagious,  was  caught  by  large  numbers  of  the 
Republican  party  in  the  6o's.  It  is  known  to  all  that  the  Creator 
has  implanted  in  the  very  atoms  of  the  human  being,  as  well  as  in 
the  being  of  animals,  certain  instincts  for  the  preservation  of  life 
and  the  perpetuity  of  the  race.  Among  these  instincts  is  that  of 
kinship.  Our  affections  first  go  out  to  our  parents,  our  children, 
our  relatives.  Next  they  go  out  to  the  people  of  our  own  coun- 
try, our  own  color  and  blood.  The  white  race  loves  white  people 
Hiore  than  it  does  the  yellow,  the  red  or  the  black.  Negroes  pre- 
fer their  own  color ;  they  naturally  affiliate  with  negroes  in 
preference  to  whites,  Chinese  or  Japanese.  This  is  the  law  of 
kinship.    Any  reverse  of  this  law  is  perversion — perversion  is  « 


266  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap. 


33 


species  of  insanity.  We  have  shown  that  in  the  year  1796  certain 
New  England  FederaHsts,  to  attain  a  certain  object  they  had  in 
view,  set  themselves  to  work  to  promulgate  the  gospel  of  hate 
toward  the  people  of  the  South.  By  dint  of  teaching  hate  the 
teachers  developed  that  feeling  in  their  own  hearts.  As  the 
te«»ching  went  on,  the  feeling  increased  in  intensity  until  it  be- 
came an  insanity,  a  monomania  utterly  beyond  the  control  or  the 
influence  of  reason.  Finally  it  came  to  pass  that  from  this  in- 
sanity of  hate  there  sprung  an  insanity  of  love.  The  former 
was  directed  toward  the  white  people  of  the  South,  the  latter  to- 
ward the  negroes.  Without  evidence  from  the  papers  and  publi- 
cation.s  of  that  day,  the  white  men  of  this  generation  will  not  be 
able  to  believe  that  New  England,  as  well  as  large  numbers  of 
ilie  P ''publican  party,  came  to  admire  and  respect  the  negro  race 
as  morally  and  mentally  superior  to  the  white.  At  first  thii 
strange  insanity  only  held  that  the  negroes  in  the  South  were  far 
superior  in  every  way  to  Southern  w'hites ;  but  as  time  passed  the 
insanity  took  on  a  more  violent  form,  and  those  so  afflicted  believed 
and  taught  that  as  a  race  the  negro  was  greatly  superior,  morally 
and  mentally,  to  the  whole  Caucasian  race,  and  not  only  this,  they 
came  to  admire  every  peculiar  quality  of  the  negro,  the  blackness 
of  their  skins,  their  woolly  hair.  Their  whole  makeup  New  England 
orators  and  writers  dwelt  on  with  a  sort  of  worshiping  rapture 
and  urged  intermarriage  between  blacks  and  whites,  not  to  ele- 
vate the  former,  but  the  latter. 

Extracts  from  speeches  and  papers  will  throw  light  on  this 
subject.  In  the  early  stages  of  his  insanity  Wendell  Phillips 
was  fond  of  announcing  to  his  audiences  that  "negroes  are  our 
acknowledged  equals.  They  are  our  brothers  and  sisters."  As 
time  went  on  Mr.  Phillips'  distemper  became  more  heated.  He 
was  not  satisfied  wdth  asserting  that  "negroes  are  our  equals ;"  he 
made  the  startling  annovmcement  that — 

"Negroes  are  our  Nobility !" 
And  began  to  clamor  that  special  privileges  be  granted  to  "our 
nobility."  He  wanted  all  the  land  in  the  Southern  States  divided 
and  bestowed  on  "our  nobility"  and  their  heirs  forever.  What 
"our  nobility"  had  done  to  deserve  this  rich  reward  Mr.  Phillips 
did  not  explain.  Perhaps  he  thought  tlie  fact  that  negroes  had 
been  brought  from  Africa  in  a  savage  state,  and  had  acquired 
in  the  hard  school  of  slavery  some  of  the  arts  of  civilization,  fit- 
ted them  to  become  a  noble  class. 

Governor  Stone  of  Iowa,  in  a  speech  made  at  Keokuk,  Au- 
gust 3,   1863,  was  certainly  in  the  first  stages  of  this  insanity 


Chap.  33  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  267 

when  he  said  to  his  audience : 

"I  hold  the  Democracy  in  the  utmost  contempt.  I  would 
rather  eat  with  a  negro,  drink  with  a  negro,  and  sleep  with 
a  negro  than  with  a  Copperhead"  (meaning  a  Democrat). 

The  disease  certainly  had  struck  Mr.  Morrow  B.  Lowry, 
State  Senator  of  Pennsylvania,  when  at  a  large  meeting  in  Phil- 
adelphia, in  1863,  he  said  to  his  audience: 

"For  all  I  know  the  Napoleon  of  this  war  may  be  done 
up  in  a  black  package.  We  have  no  evidence  of  his  being 
done  up  in  a  white  one.  The  man  who  talks  of  elevating  a 
negro  would  not  have  to  elevate  him  very  much  to  make  him 
equal  to  himself." 

The  faithful  old  New  York  Independent  sorrowfully  wailed 
over  the  long  delayed  coming  of  the  Black  Napoleon,  which  all 
the  insane  negro-worshipers  confidentlv  looked  for. 

"God  and  negroes,"  said  the  Independent,  "are  to 
save  the  country.  For  two  years  the  white  soldiers  of  this 
country  have  been  trying  to  find  a  path  to  victory.  The  ne- 
groes are  the  final  reliance  of  our  Government.  Negroes  are 
the  keepers  and  the  saviors  of  our  cause.  Negroes  are  the 
forlorn  hope  of  our  Republican  party." 

James  Parton,  the  noted  biographer,  was  strongly  touched 
with  the  prevailing  disease — insane  love  of  negroes. 

"Many  a  negro,"  wrote  James  Parton,  in  1863,  "stands 
in  the  same  kind  of  moral  relation  to  his  master  as  that  in 
which  Jesus  Christ  stood  to  the  Jews,  and  not  morally  only, 
for  he  stands  above  his  master  at  a  height  which  the  master 
can  neither  see  nor  understand." 

J.  W.  Phelps,  General  in  the  Republican  army,  thought  the 
negro  race  much  better  adapted  to  receive  Christianity  than  the 
white. 

"Christianity,"  said  Phelps,  "is  planted  in  the  dark  rich 
soil  of  the  African  nature.  Negroes  are  as  intelligent  and 
far  more  moral  than  the  whites.  The  slaves  appeal  to  the 
moral  law,  clinging  to  it  as  to  the  very  horns  of  the  altar ;  he 
bears  no  resentment,  he  asks  for  no  punishment  for  his  , 
master." 

A  little  work,  ably  written,  titled  "Miscegenation,"  was  pub- 
lished in  1863  or  1864.  Before  this  work  was  out  a  white  woman, 
Miss   Annie   Dickinson,    called   by    Republicans     "The    Modern 


268  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.     33 

Joan  of  Arc/'  became  a  convert  to  the  doctrine  of  intermarriage 
between  whites  and  blacks  and  an  eloquent  expounder  of  the 
same.  Miss  Dickinson  lectured  over  the  Northern  States.  It 
was  said  at  the  time  that  President  Lincohi  and  his  Cabinet  at- 
tended her  lectures  in  Washington  City.  Miss  Dickinson  wrote 
a  novel  called  "What  Answer?"  the  purpose  of  which  was  to 
illustrate  the  beauty  and  utility  of  marriage  between  negro  men 
and  white  women,  and  negro  women  and  white  men.  The  char- 
acters in  "What  Answer?"  are  negroes  and  whites.  They  fall  in 
love  and  marry  in  a  way  to  affright  and  disgust  people  not  up  to 
date  on  such  doctrines.  The  title,  "What  Answer?"  was  sup- 
posed to  indicate  that  the  author's  argument  could  not  be  retuted. 
On  the  night  Miss  Dickinson  was  to  lecture  at  Cooper  Institute, 
New  York  City,  she  was  late  in  appearing;  the  impatient  audi- 
ence was  quieted  by  the  distribution  of  circulars  advertising  the 
new  work,  "Miscegenation,"  just  published. 

George  Sala,  correspondent  of  the  London  Telegraph,  was 
then  in  Washington  City,  and  wrote  his  paper  as  follows : 

"Miss  Dickinson  comes  accredited  by  persons  of  high 
authority.  She  is  handed  to  the  rostrum  by  the  second  per- 
sonage in  the  North.  The  Speaker  of  the  House  is  her  gen- 
tleman usher.  The  Chief  of  the  State  (Lincoln)  and  his 
ministers  swell  the  number  of  her  auditors.  She  is  the  god- 
dess of  Republican  idolatry." 

February,  1863,  the  correspondent  of  the  London  Times 
wrote  from  New  York  describing  Republican  love  of  the  negro 
race : 

"It  has  been  discovered  here,"  wrote  the  Times  corres- 
pondent, "that  in  many  important  respects  the  negro  is  su- 
perior to  the  whites;  that  if  the  latter  do  not  forget  their 
pride  of  race,  and  blood,  and  color,  and  amalgamate  with 
the  'purer  and  richer  blood'  of  the  blacks,  they  will  die  out 
and  wither  away  in  unprolific  skinniness.  The  first  to  give 
tongue  to  the  new  doctrine  were  Theodore  Tilton  and  the 
Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher.  The  latter  a  few  months  ago 
declared  that  it  was  good  for  white  women  to  marry  black 
men,  and  that  the  passion  and  emotional  nature  of  the 
blacks  were  needed  to  improve  the  white  race.  Mr.  Wendell 
Phillips  has  often  hinted  the  same  thing." 

The  London  Times  of  February  5,  1862  or  1863,  I  am  not 
certain  which,  contained  copious  extracts  from  "Miscegenation," 
as  samples  of  the  love-insanity  for  the  negroes  which  at  that  time 


Chap.  33  Facts  and  Falsehoods  269 

afflicted  the  Republican  party.  I  also  offer  a  few  extracts  from 
"Miscegenation :" 

"All  that  is  needed,"  says  the  author  of  "Miscegena- 
tion," "to  make  us  the  finest  race  on  earth  is  to  engraft  upon 
our  stock  the  negro  element  which  Providence  has  placed 
by  our  side  upon  this  continent.  (The  Providence  were 
New  England's  slave-stealers  who  imported  negroes  from 
Africa  and  sold  them  to  the  South's  planters).  Of  all  the 
rich  treasures  of  blood  vouchsafed  to  us,  that  of  the  negro  is 
the  most  precious.  By  mingling  with  negroes  \vc  will  be- 
come powerful,  progressive  and  prosperous.  By  refusing  to 
do  so  we  will  become  feeble,  unhealthy,  narrow-minded,  un- 
fit of  noble  offices  of  freedom  and  certain  of  early  decy. 
White  people  are  perishing  for  want  of  flesh  and  blood ;  they 
are  dry  and  shriveled,  for  lack  of  the  healthful  juices  of  life. 
Their  cheeks  are  sunken,  their  lips  are  thin  and  bloodless, 
their  under  jaws  narrow  and  retreating,  their  noses  sharp 
and  cold,  their  teeth  decayed,  their  eyes  small  and  watery, 
their  complexion  of  a  blue  and  yellow  hue,  their  heads  and 
shoulders  bent  forward,  hair  dry  and  straggling.  The  waists 
of  white  women  are  thin  and  pinched,  telling  of  sterility  and 
consumption ;  their  whole  aspect  is  gaunt  and  cadaverous ; 
they  wear  spectacles  and  paint  their  faces.  The  social  inter- 
course between  the  sexes  is  acetic,  formal,  unemotional. 
How  different  is  an  assembly  of  negroes !  Every  cheek  is 
plump,  the  teeth  are  white,  the  eyes  large  and  bright,  every 
form  is  stalwart,  every  face  wears  a  smile.  American  white 
men  need  contact  with  warm-blooded  negresses  to  fill  up  the 
interstices  of  their  anatomy.  I  plead  for  amalgamation,  not 
for  my  own  individual  pleasure,  but  for  my  country,  for  the 
cause  of  progress,  for  the  world,  for  Christianity.  It  is  a 
mean  pride  unworthy  of  an  enlightened  community  that  will 
deny  the  principle  of  amalgamation.  This  principle  has 
touched  a  chord  in  humanity  that  vibrates  with  a  sweet, 
strange,  marvelous  music,  awakening  the  slumbering  in- 
stincts of  the  Nation  and  the  world.  It  would  be  a  sad  mis- 
fortune if  this  war  should  end  without  a  black  general  in 
command.  We  want  an  American  Touisant  rOverturc.  It  is 
in  the  eternal  fitness  of  things  that  the  South  should  be  con- 
quered by  black  soldiers.  After  that  the  land  of  the  South 
must  be  divided  among  negroes." 

The  London  correspondent  of  the  Times  wrote  that  paper 
that  doctrines  of  this  nature  were  applauded  by  large  audiences 


2/0  '  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  Chap.    33 

of  men  and  women  in  the  North.  Time  has  proved  how  little 
the  Republican  party  understood  the  Caucasian  or  the  African 
race.  No  Touisant  rOvcrtiire  appeared  on  the  scene.  No  black 
general  came  forward  to  "fill  the  eternal  fitness  of  things."  On 
the  contrary,  all  during  the' war  the  negroes  in  the  South  were 
amiable  servitors,  docile  and  obedient  to  their  white  mistresses 
while  their  masters  were  at  the  front  fighting  the  armed  invaders 
of  their  country. 

Among  the  cartoons  of  that  time  were  a  number  illustrative 
of  the  doctrine  of  "Miscegenation."  One  with  that  title  is  now 
in  the  collection  of  the  New  York  Historical  Society.  The  Rev. 
Henry  Ward  Beecher  is  pictured  holding  the  hand  of  a  big  black, 
buxom  negress,  whom  he  is  presenting  to  President  Lincoln, 
who  is  bending  his  head  to  her  as  to  a  queen.  The  black  "lady" 
is  dressed  in  the  extreme  of  fashion,  showing  all  her  teeth  by  a 
happy  grin.  Near  by  sits  Horace  Greeley,  treating  to  ice  cream  an- 
other big  black  "lady,"  arrayed  in  all  her  finery.  Beyond  is  a  hor- 
ribly ugly  black  man  in  a  chair,  holding  in  his  lap  a  pretty  young 
white  girl,  apparently  pleased  with  the  situation.  Near  this 
couple  is  another  hideous  negro  man  about  to  kiss  a  pretty  white 
girl. 

The  doctrine  of  "Miscegenation"  highly  delighted  Northern 
negroes.  Frederick  Douglas,  half  white  and  half  black,  was  es- 
pecially pleased.  Douglas  addressed  a  large  Republican  meeting 
in  Brooklyn,  1863,  on  the  subject  of  amalgamation.     He  said: 

"There  is  not  now  much  prejudice  against  colored  men.  A 
few  days  ago  a  white  lady  asked  me  to  walk  down  Broadway 
with  her,  and  insisted  on  taking  my  arm ;  everyone  we  met 
stared  at  us  as  if  we  were  curious  animals.  By  and  by  you 
will  get  over  this  nonsense.  (Cheers).  You  ought  to  see  me 
in  London  walking  down  Regent  street  with  a  white  lady  on 
each  arm,  and  nobody  stared  at  us.  And  it  will  soon  be  so 
here,  and  then  we  will  all  be  the  nobler  and  better." 

The  London  Times  during  the  war  of  the  6o's  published  in 
its  columns  extracts  from  a  pamphlet  issued  in  the  North,  which 
boldly  asserted  the  lie  that — 

"The  first  love  of  the  beautiful  young  daughters  of  the 
proud  planters  of  the  South  was  for  one  of  their  father's 
negro  slaves.  The  mothers  and  daughters,"  said  this  in- 
sane writer,  "of  the  Southern  aristocracy  are  thrilled  ivith  a 
strange  delight  by  daily  contact  with  their  dusky  servitors." 


Chap.  ^;^  Facts  and  Falsehoods.  271 

The  mothers  and  daughters  of  the  South,  when  chancing  to 
see  insane  stuff  of  this  nature,  passed  it  by  as  the  kniacy  of  a  foul 
and  distempered  mind. 

With  this  I  rest  the  case  which,  ere  long,  will  be  tried  in 
Posteritj'-'s  Court — the  South  vs.  the  Repubhcan  party  of  the  6o's. 

And  as  a  last  thought,  I  offer  the  reader  the  prophetic  lines 
written  by  that  inspired  poet.  Father  Ryan,  of  Alalmnia : 

"There  is  grandeur  in  graves,  there  is  glory  in  gloom. 
For  out  of  the  gloom  future  brightness  is  born. 
And  after  the  night  comes  the  sunrise  of  morn. 
And  the  graves  of  the  dead,  with  the  grass  overgrown. 
Shall  yet  form  the  footstool  of  Liberty's  throne. 
And  each  single  wreck  in  the  warpath  of  Might 
Shall  yet  be  a  rock  in  the  Temple  of  Right." 

.Note. 

Numbers  of  soldiers  in  the  United  States  armies  in 

different  wars: 

Revolutionary,    1775-1783    309,781 

Northwest  Indian  War,  1790-95    8.983 

Tripoli  War — Naval,  1801-5  3,330 

England,   1812-15    576,622 

First  Seminole,  Florida,  1817-18 7,91 1 

Second  Seminole,  Florida,  1835-43   41,122 

Third  Seminole,  Florida,  1856-58   3,68i 

Black  Hawk  War,  1831-32  6,465 

Creek  War,  1836-37 13418 

Aroostook  War,  1838-39  i.SO'^ 

Mexican,  April,   1846,  July,  1848 1 12.230 

1,085,043 
War  upon  the  South,  1861-65  2,772,408 

Excess    1,687,365 

From  above  it  will  be  seen  the  United  States  employed  in  its 
four  years'  of  war  upon  the  South  1,687,365  more  soldiers  than  in 
all  its  thirty-six  years  of  war  with  England,  Tripoli,  Mexico  and 
the  Indian  tribes. 


m 


